A Turn for the Worse
by Whackadoo
Summary: Ben and Amber find themselves in trouble with vamps when Dean and Sam come to clean up the mess. This takes place sometime after my first adult Ben story, "Ghosts". Amber is an OC and Ben is my take on him as and adult.
1. Chapter 1

"Come on, Braeden, we got another one!" Bailey called out as he headed for the door.

I grabbed my jacket that was thrown over the back of my chair and hurried to catch up to Tom. "What have we got?"

"Female. Mid to late twenties. Throat torn apart. Matches the previous vics." Tom said as we got into one of the department's unmarked cars.

"Damn, that makes four now. Sarge must be losing his mind."

"You ain't kidding."

Over the last month and a half, there have been three other murders. All the same profile. Female victim, mid to late twenties, with their throats ravaged. The other three bodies also had a disturbing similarity...they were almost completely drained of blood. The wounds to the neck just screamed animal attack. But animals would tear at other parts of the body too. There are usually signs of gnawing or eating. These just had wounds to the neck. Also, animals don't usually drain the blood from their prey. I mean, these victims didn't bleed out onto the ground. The blood was gone, taken. To what purpose, we'd yet to figure out.

"So. Scene in the same area?"

Tom glanced in his rear view mirror as he changed lanes for a left turn. "Yeah. Out in the club district. Found in an alley behind Blue 22. Guy taking some garbage out to the dumpster found her."

As we pulled up to the scene, I could see that news vans were already on sight. Uniforms were trying to keep the reporters and cameras back. Saw horses and police tape were being put up. We smiled to a couple of the uniforms and they let us through.

The victim was tucked in the corner formed by the side of the dumpster and the wall of the building. She looked like she just collapsed, her legs tucked under her. She appeared to be about 26 or 27 years of age, light brown, shoulder length hair; wearing a shimmery dress. She probably had been out clubbing.

Tom nodded a greeting to the CSI guys that were on scene. "How's it looking, Grady?"

Grady looked up from the cotton swab he was dabbing into a puddle of something. "Same as the others, blood drained. No prints."

The only set of prints we'd been able to pick up at a previous scene had belonged to someone who had died 8 years previously. Not sure about that one. I think Grady messed something up while lifting the print. Accidents do happen.

"So, once again, we'll have nothing to send back to Amber at the lab?"

"Well," Grady held up his cotton swab, "we'll have this drop of blood that was here near the body. It probably belongs to the vic, but ya never know."

I sighed and headed back to the police line to observe the onlookers. Sometimes the suspect has an unhealthy fascination with their own work. They hang around, acting like a spectator, reveling in the chaos, the media, the sorrow. I held a notepad and pen in my hands, acting like I was taking notes, and slowly scanned along the line of people at the barricades. For the most part, they were your typical group. You had those who hounded the media, hoping to get on camera...those who were simply just curious...those trying to take pictures and video to upload to the internet, hoping for their 15 seconds of fame...and then there was the girl at the end.

She stood alone amid the crowd. She was crying, holding her hands cupped up around her mouth, mascara running down her cheeks. She was looking but not, at the same time. If I were to wave my hand in front of her face, I'm not sure she would have noticed. I walked over, introduced myself, and asked if I could have a word with her. She simply nodded blankly at me. I touched her arm and guided her away from the crowd.

"You seem very upset. Do you know what happened?" I asked as gently as I could.

"I...she..." She tried to answer but the tears were getting in the way.

"Why don't we start with your name?"

"Becca. My name is Becca"

"Okay, Becca, take a moment. Try to calm down and tell me about it."

She took a steadying breath, her voice hitching. "Stacey, me, and Rae came out to Blue 22 for Stacey's birthday. It was just supposed to be drinks, some dancing, that's it! There were these guys..."

"These guys...how many?" I interrupted.

"Huh? Oh, um four. Four guys. They started hitting on us, dancing with us. We were all just having a good time, ya know? Then they were all trying to get us to go home with them. Stacey and Rae were all for it. Party it up, ya know? But I wasn't. I mean I was, but I had an early work day tomorrow. They were off and could party all night if they wanted, ya know?"

Her 'ya know's were beginning to irritate, but I knew that she was just nervous. "So did they leave with the four men?"

"I went to the bathroom, telling them I was going to head home after and when I came out they were all gone, Stacey, Rae and the guys. I'm just really scared that the dead person is one of my friends, ya know? They aren't answering my texts and they never do that."

I thought about it for a minute and then decided to see if she could ID the body since the lab guys had found nothing with her. "If you don't mind, I'd like to take you down and see if you can identify her. There's no ID or purse..."

She looked up at me nervously. I could see in her eyes that she wanted to but was terrified of the thought at the same time. "Stay here a minute, I'll be right back." I went back to Tom and told him what was up. We had Grady cover the body, including the neck wound with a drape from his truck, to make it a little less traumatic and then I went back to fetch Becca.

I led her down the alley and could feel her noticeably slowing down as we got closer. Once we were within view, she broke down.

"Oh God! That's Stacey! Oh Stacey, what happened?" She started sobbing even harder. I gently grabbed her arm and started leading her away. "Where's Rae? Rae! Where is she? Where is she?!" She was getting hysterical. I passed her off to one of our female officers to calm her down and get the rest of her statement for the record.

Returning to Tom I asked, "So, where **is** Rae?"

! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

**AN: Hope I've drawn you into another adventure with Ben. Hoping to see a bit more of him and Amber in this story. I never thought I'd write any more after Ghosts, but I've surprised myself. PLEASE leave your reviews and let me know what you think! Thanks!**


	2. Chapter 2

It was frustrating to know that someone was missing and we had nothing to go on. Well, to be honest, we had more this time than any of the previous times. Four guys. Tom sent me into Blue 22 to see if they had any security cameras set up. We were hoping to get a shot of our four mysterious guys. They had two cameras, one at the till and bar and one looking straight down on the DJ area. Basically watching the two high ticket, theft areas. Our guys never went near the DJ and never ordered a drink. So that was a strike out.

I asked around to other people who had been in the club, but nobody remembered anything out of the ordinary.

On the drive back to the station, Tom and I brainstormed. "I wonder who our four mysterious guys are?"

Tom glanced at me "Well, let's hope Becca had some descriptions to give Officer Harding. That will at least be a start."

"We'll need to get a good description of this Rae girl out to all the precincts too." I sat in silence thinking for a moment. "Tom. I wonder if there are any other missing persons coinciding with the previous vics?"

"Hmm. Good thinking. We'll have to look into that tomorrow... So, no prints, again! I mean nothing! Sooner or later something has to give." Tom grumped.

"Well, we now have confirmed it's not animals." I said brightly.

Tom turned a sour look on me. "We already knew that, Ben."

"No. We assumed it." I grinned at him and he just shook his head and rolled his eyes.

"So we have four guys who are not only killing girls and draining their blood, but also kidnapping them. To what end?"

Tom frowned as he watched the traffic pass through an intersection ahead of us. "To kill later? Maybe dump the body elsewhere to throw us off their tracks?"

"They're not leaving tracks, remember? Maybe they're some sort of satanic cult and they need a girl and a bunch of blood for some whack job ritual..."

"Hmm. I suppose anything's possible at this point."

"It would be great if that blood drop Grady found led to something. Otherwise we're back to square one. Four guys without descriptions doesn't give us much."

We pulled back into the lot at the station and Tom sighed. "We need something to break. Sarge is catching a lot of heat from the mayor. The press is starting to hint at serial killer." He rubbed his face and eyes with his hand. "If we're going to pull a rabbit out of our hats, now's the time to do it."

I sighed as well. I felt like we had been running around in circles on this case. Chasing down empty leads and ghosts. Tom was right, we needed something to give and soon.

"Well, I'll see you tomorrow, Tom." I said as I got out of the car.

"Yeah. You too. Tell Amber I said hello."

"Will do."

We each headed our separate ways, mulling over the night's events in our heads.

ooooOOOOoooo

Even though it was late, Amber waited up. She always has, ever since we moved in together two years ago. She says she knows I'll need to 'unpack' it all when I get home and so that's why she does it. Whatever her reasons, I'm glad to see her when I walk in.

"Hey, honey. Rough night?" She asks as she reaches out to take my coat.

"Ugh. Yes. We've had another one." I sigh. I take my gun holster off and set it with it's gun on the coffee table. I sit down and start working on getting my boots off.

Amber hangs my coat in the closet and heads into the kitchen to grab me a beer. "Please tell me you got something this time." She comes back in, hands me the beer and curls up on the couch next to me.

"Actually we got a lot this time...and nothing." I flopped back into the couch and put my feet up on the coffee table.

"Explain."

"Well, you'll be happy to know that Grady found a drop of blood for you." I look sideways at her. I know she'll be pleased to be able to finally do something on this case.

"Yes! Finally!" she says, doing a little fist pump.

I chuckle. "We also have someone who knew and was with the vic AND four possible suspects."

"Okay, if that's the case, then why do you look like a kid who just lost his dog?"

"Because there is no security camera footage of the four guys, no one remembers anything about them. They came and went, just like that." I snap my fingers. "We have a missing persons now too." I lean my head back against the back of the couch and close my eyes. I can still see Becca's horrified, terrified face in my mind.

"Missing persons? In relation to your current case?"

"Yeah. Three girls out clubbing last night. Two left with the four guys, one was found dead and the other is no where to be found. She hasn't made contact with friends, family, or her employer. When I go in tomorrow, I'm going to see if there are any other missing persons that might fall in with our killings."

"Sounds like a plan. I can't wait to get at the blood sample! I hope it's not another fluke like that finger print." I smiled at her and made to get up. "Hey, Ben, don't forget that Friday we're going to see Austin and his band. They're playing down at La Rue, remember?"

"Oh, trust me, he hasn't let me forget" I said with a chuckle. What I didn't say is I didn't want Amber anywhere near the club district, but at least I'd be with her.

"I'm beat and my mind is mush, I think I'll grab a shower and hit the hay." I reached over and squeezed her knee as I got up. She grabbed my beer bottle and started for the kitchen. As I walked away, I heard her chuckling.

"What's so funny?" I called, still walking.

"Oh, never mind."

I stopped and turned back toward her. "What?" She had a goofy grin that made me want to kiss her in the worst way.

"Well, I was just thinking that, with all the blood missing from your victims, that maybe it's vampires." She chuckled again and held her arm across her face saying, "I vant to suck your blood!"

I grinned back at her. "That's a horrible Dracula."

"Maybe you should call your father to come in and add his _expert_ opinion."

She said it tongue in cheek. I never told her about everything I'd seen when Dean and I were tortured by a ghoul. She would have thought I was crazy or chalk it up to some sort of post traumatic stress thing. Hell, most days, **I** question what I saw that day.

I laughed with her, said a sarcastic 'yeah', and headed into the bathroom. The hot water felt good. I felt like I was washing the dirtiness of humanity off of me. Some nights it was hard trying to understand how or why people do such evil to each other. Thank God I had Amber. She was my light in the darkness. Always quick with a joke or a smile.

I wondered, now, if I shouldn't be taking her latest joke a bit more seriously. If such creatures as ghouls existed, is it possible that all the rest were real too? I mean, I only really half listened way back, when Sam had told me about all sorts of things he and my father had hunted. At the time, I thought they were half crazy. Now, after the ghoul thing and Amber's comment, I was beginning to think maybe they weren't as crazy as I first took them for.

Either way, I couldn't dwell on fantasy and 'what ifs'. They wouldn't bring Becca's friend, Rae, back. I needed to focus on what we _did_ have and know. I sighed, turned my face into the water, and let it all wash away.

! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

**AN: I know...where are Sam and Dean? They're coming, never fear! I had to set the scene first...Patience! Thanks for reading!**


	3. Chapter 3

I woke early the next morning with Amber snuggled up and around me. It made me wonder why I had waited so long to broach the subject of a relationship with her. I inched out from around her and went about my morning routine.

I wanted to leave early and swing by Blue 22 on my way to the station. Well, not actually Blue 22, but the businesses near by. I was hoping to find one or more that had exterior security cameras that may have caught our suspects on film.

After canvassing the area, I found only one business with exterior cameras. The pawn shop sat almost directly across the street from the club. I went in, flashed my badge, and asked if the owner or manager was available. The guy behind the counter was a big dude, bald, goatee, with tattoos on his arms. Looked the classic biker. He looked me up and down, eyes pausing on the scars on my face.

"You're lookin' at him."

"Morning, Detective Braeden." I held out my hand. He eyed me again and then shook it.

"Clif Harrolsen."

"I noticed you have a security camera out front. I was wondering if you'd let me see any footage from yesterday evening."

"This 'bout that dead girl?" He seemed to physically relax once I told him what I wanted. I'm sure not everything that goes on here is above board, but sometimes you've got to let the little fish go, in order to get at the big ones.

"Yes it is." I answered him. "If you'd let me have it or make a copy of it, it could help."

"Yeah sure. I doubt you'll get anything helpful off it." He slipped out from behind the counter, locked the front door, and flipped the 'open' sign to 'closed'. "I'm alone here today. Don't wanna leave it unattended. Come back here."

He led me to the back of the little shop and through a door marked with dings and scratches in which you could see layers of varying colors of paint. Through the door was a small office with a metal desk and metal shelves, one of which held a small microwave and a radio. Sitting on the floor was an old tv, complete with rabbit ear antennae. Clif's size dominated the small room.

He turned immediately to the right. There, in the corner, was a cabinet, of sorts, with wire mesh doors. He pulled out some keys and unlocked it. Inside was his antiquated security system. He ejected a VHS tape and handed it over. I looked at it and then up at him, raising my eyebrows.

"What?" he says.

I clear my throat. "Ah, nothing. Thank you, sir, for your time and cooperation."

"Yeah sure."

I took my new found relic out to my car, chuckling. Now I had to find a working VCR.

0000OOOO0000

As I walked into the office area for my department, I could see Tom was already there.

"Where have you been, Braeden?" It sounded like a scolding, but I knew he was just messing with me.

I held up my prize and answered, "Look what I scored this morning."

He looked at the VHS tape with a frown. "An antique?"

"This, my friend, is the security camera footage from the pawn shop across the street from Blue 22."

"Which is useless to us if we can't find some ancient device to play it on..." Tom grinned at me.

"Yeah, well, there's that. If I can't find anything around here, I bet the library has something."

"Well, Ben, while you were out clubbing this morning, I looked into your missing persons idea." Tom held up a piece of paper and waved it in the air.

I made my way over to his desk, set down the tape, and snatched the paper out of his hands. He made a grab for it but was too slow. "You're getting slow, old man." I grinned as I read over what was a missing persons report.

"Hey, watch it! I'm only five years older than you, you punk." He sat down at his desk, leaned back in his chair and set his feet up on the desktop. "So, as you can see, we do have another missing persons that coincides with the second murder three weeks ago. Steve Marks. College room mate reported him missing. Said he'd gone out for a drink after bombing on some big test."

"Him? You think it ties in with our case? All our vics have been female thus far." I pursed my lips together in thought.

"Quit duck-facing, Braeden..."

I smiled. I often pursed my lips together in thought, often not realizing I was doing it. It was one of my few quirks and he liked to razz me about it.

"Anyway, I don't want to discount it, just in case. He was last seen at Oscar's Pub which is about two blocks down from Blue 22. It is within the area that our suspects seem to be focusing on."

Tom turned to a map he had on his PC that he had added little pins to at each of the scenes. All the sites that we had found victims were within a three block radius that was in the heart of the club district. The area included shops like the pawn shop, but there were a lot of bars and dance clubs, the few adult video stores and even a couple strip clubs as well. The dance clubs drew a lot of the kids from the local college and the rest drew in the adults. Drugs and prostitution were an issue in the area as well. Now, don't get me wrong, the area was a great place to go out and have a great time. A lot of the clubs had live entertainment and the drugs and prostitution tended to stay to the one block near the strip clubs.

Tom pointed to his map and there was a green pin set on the right side of the map. That was his missing persons spot. I noticed there was another green pin next to the red one at Blue 22 for Rae.

I opened my mouth to ask him something. "Before you ask, I already called down to the pub about it. After the normal complaints of having already told the police all this once already, they told me that Steve left with two guys. That's all they could tell me. You're duck-facing again..."

"Do we have descriptions on our suspects, yet?" I asked.

"They're working on it as we speak."

"Okay, cool. I'm going to see if I can hunt down a VCR."

"Yeah. Good luck with that."

So I spent the next hour and a half hunting around the station. I popped into the lab and said hi to Amber. Even though everyone knew, by now, that we were together, we were very careful to keep our work relationship strictly work. She had no idea about any VCR's and wished me luck on my quest. I found an old storage closet in the basement that actually had a VCR in it, but it was missing some cable it needed to actually hook it up to the tv in the break room. So, after two hours wasted, I grabbed Tom and we headed over to the library.

I knew I could count on the library. Publicly funded and therefore not caught up with all the latest, it had a VCR and tv ready to go. We commandeered an office, for privacy, and settled down to watch. Almost immediately, we knew we had nothing. The angle that the camera was set up at only showed from about the knees down of anyone across the street.

"Well, this is shit." griped Tom.

"Tell me about it. I thought I'd finally found something that could catch us a break." I sighed.

We watched it through, anyway, and did eventually identify our suspects by the shoes of our vic. What did we learn? One of our suspects had a thing for cowboy boots. We thanked the nice people at the library and headed out for a bite to eat.

"This is one of those cases, Ben." Tom eventually said around a mouthful of hamburger.

"What kind of case is that?"

"The kind that either makes you, or breaks you. The kind, that if we can solve it, we'll be heros, get promotions, the whole nine. Or, we have some serial killer run rampant all over our town and our careers get flushed down the crapper. Along with Sarge's career, the Captains, hell, maybe even the mayor."

"Great and I was just getting started." I said with a sarcastic whine. "So what do we do next?"

"I guess we wait, hope Amber can come up with something from that blood drop, and pray there aren't any more murders before we can get some sort of lead."

Just then my cell rang followed closely by Tom's. We looked ominously at each other and answered our respective phones.

"Breaden."

"Heya Ben, Amber. I got something on that blood drop."

"Thank God. That's just the news we've been waiting for!" Finally a break in this god forsaken case.

"Well, I'm not sure if it's the kind of break you're looking for. Listen I'll tell you guys all about it when you get down here."

"Amber, hold on a second." Tom was waving his hand at me, trying to get my attention.

I raised my eyebrows at him to let him know I was listening.

"Fuck it, Ben, we got another one."

"Son of a bitch. Okay." Turning back to my phone I said, "Listen Amber, put your news on ice. We've got another body."

"Already? Seems a little fast."

"Yeah. Haven't had two in one week before. Talk to you later, we gotta go." I hung up, grabbed what was left of my drink and tossed my garbage from lunch. Tom was already waiting at the car.

"Where to?" I asked as I climbed in.

"Dumpster out by Bosco's."

"Hmm, not the usual M.O. Bosco's doesn't cater to the young college crowd does it?"

"Nah. It's your typical bar. Couple pool tables, a few tv's with sports or whatever. Draws mostly older locals."

We were silent for the rest of the drive.

Only one difference in this body from all the rest. It was male.

"Well...that's different..." I said. The local officer at the scene gave me a look. "Sorry. All the other vics have been female. Wasn't quite expecting this."

Tom was looking at the wound on the neck. "Same wounds, same apparent loss of blood. I would have to say it's the same guys. We haven't released the blood loss thing to the public, so it can't be a copy cat."

There was no real crowd gathered around, like the last scene. Middle of the day, people were at work, going about their day to day lives. We asked around inside the bar. No one really remembered anything strange. The guy came in for a few drinks, watched some of last night's b-ball on the tv, then left. We went back out to the scene and Grady had arrived.

"So, you got anything?" Tom asked.

"Seriously? Guys, I just got here! Give me a moment." He looked past us then and frowned. "Crap. You guys better put your game faces on. Feds just showed up."

Tom turned around and looked back towards the road. "Shit. I guess it was only a matter of time before those fuckers had to come sniffing around. Don't turn around Ben. Just act cool and don't offer them any more info than what they ask for."

"Tom. Aren't we all on the same side here?" I said.

He just chuckled. "Oh kid, they treat us like back woods village idiots. They want to steal the case and the glory of a capture, make them do it on their own and not on our backs."

I then hear a familiar, rough, gravelly voice. "Special Agents Dresden and Murphy. Hear you fellas are having some trouble."

I start to cough hard in an attempt to cover my initial reaction. I don't want anyone to see me show in any way that I already knew these particular agents. I bend over at the waist, coughing. Special Agent Dresden pounds me on the back hard enough to practically knock me to the ground.

"You okay, there, officer?" he asks.

I stand up, look him in the eye and say "That's Detective and yes, I'm fine."

Agent Murphy speaks up. "So, same cause of death as all the rest?" He bends down and checks out the wound on the vic's neck.

"Yeah. Throat torn to shreds and body drained of blood." Tom said. "Lab guys just got here, so nothing yet on that front."

"Is it true you've found nothing at any of the scenes, other than a screwy print?" Agent Dresden asks.

Grady took offense. "There was nothing wrong with that print, damn it!"

"Chill out, Grady. There was a drop of blood at the last scene that they just processed." I offered. Tom gave me a look. He apparently did not approve of my sharing that info. I knew these 'feds' weren't out to steal the case, though, but I had no way to tell him that.

"And?" the agent inquired.

"Well we were on our way back to the lab when they called this in. We haven't seen the results yet."

"Well, maybe we'll just follow you back to the station and check that out with you." Agent Murphy said.

Tom grumped, turned, and headed towards the car.

"Sure that would be fine." I answered, trying to be polite to our 'guests'.

0000OOOO0000

Back at the station, Tom waited at the entrance for 'those blasted Feds' to show up, while I headed down to the lab. I wanted to give Amber a heads up.

"Hey, Amber, on your toes, we've got company coming."

Amber turns from whatever she had been working on. "What? Where?" She looks past me into the hall.

"They aren't here yet, but the Feds showed up at the scene today."

"Oh, crap. How's my hair?"

I laughed. "Seriously? You might recognize these two. Please just act like business as usual okay?"

She frowned at me and was about to question me when we heard Tom coming down the hall.

"Right down here on the right."

Sam and Dean walk in, dressed in their suits, and Amber started coughing hysterically.

Dean looks at Sam and then at me. "Is there something in the air around here?"

The funniest part? Amber actually reached up and checked her hair. I just smiled.

I handled the 'introductions'. "Agents this is our Queen of the lab, Amber. Amber these are Special Agents Dresden and Murphy."

Sam offers his hand and says ma'am and Dean leans against her desk and says "Queen huh?"

"Don't lean against my desk." She crosses her arms and gives him the stare down. He quickly stands up again.

"Uh, yeah. We don't call her the queen of the lab for her winning personality. Her rules, her way. Although she has a great personality when you follow her rules."

"Nice save, Braeden." she smiles at everyone. "So I'm assuming you're all here regarding the blood drop results. I wish I could give you something better than yet another mystery, but this one might be solvable." She turns around and pulls a sheet of paper from the printer behind her. "The drop of blood belongs to none other than David Marshall."

"Uh, are we supposed to know who that is?" Tom ventured.

"Yeah, not ringing any bells here, either." I say. Sam and Dean remain stoic, waiting.

"David Marshall is a missing person. He's been missing for thirty four years. Presumed dead."

Tom throws his hands up in the air. "Seriously? That's just about as good as the finger print from the guy that died eight years ago! Come on, Amber, that can't be right. Run it again."

"Tom, I did. I ran it three times, in fact! I even had Grady check my work before he left for the scene earlier! That is 100% correct! Don't you come down here and question my work! I don't go to crime scenes and tell you how to do your job!"

Dean raised his eyebrows and smirked. "I like her."

I just grinned. Nobody steps on Amber's toes in her lab and gets away unscathed.

Tom raised his hands in surrender. "Sorry, sorry. It's been a rough case. I'm sorry, Amber, you're right. I'm just frustrated is all."

Sam kind of raised his hand before speaking. I had to laugh, Amber threw her weight around and now Uncle Sam was walking on glass.

"If you don't mind my asking, do you know how old this David was when he went missing?"

"What a great question, Agent...?"

"Murphy, ma'am." Sam smiled sweetly at her.

"Let me see, he was...twenty six years of age."

"Hmm. Thank you. Now the last report said you actually had an eye witness?" Sam turned to me. I think he didn't want to deal with Tom after what just happened.

"In a manner of speaking. She said four guys hit on her and her friends. She left to go to the bathroom, when she came back they were gone as well as her friends."

"Well, we have some other things we need to check into. I'm sure we'll be talking again. Thanks for your time."

When they turned to leave I met Tom's eyes and he was making a snarky face, imitating Sam. I laughed. He really doesn't like the FBI. I wished I could tell him they weren't really Feds, but that would get me into a ton of shit I'd never be able to crawl out of.


	4. Chapter 4

In a rare turn of events, I got out of work before Amber. I swung by the store on the way home and picked up some supplies. When I got home, there was a familiar black Impala in the driveway. And even though we are fanatical about locking up the house, my father and his brother were reclined on the couch watching tv.

"The house was locked, but I'm glad you made yourselves at home." I said sarcastically.

Sam stood up, gave me a brief hug, and grabbed the grocery bags from my hands. Dean grinned at me and said, "Boy, I've been picking locks since I was a kid." He got up, then, and gave me a bear hug. "How you been, kid?"

"Not too bad. I see you two are still alive and kicking. Stitches?" He was out of his suit jacket and had his sleeves rolled up. I had spotted a crooked line of stitches on his forearm.

"Oh those? Shape shifter out in Omaha. He didn't live to tell the tale. So..."

Just then Amber came in with grocery bags of her own. I inwardly groaned. I had forgotten to tell her I was doing some shopping.

Dean stepped over and took the bags from her. "Let me get those for you, oh Queen." He actually bowed to her.

"Watch it, smart ass." She grinned at him and he leaned down and gave her a peck on the forehead. He walked into the kitchen, winking at me as he went by.

I can't explain why or how, but when they met, Amber and Dean really hit it off. Maybe because they both had a streak of snarky, smart ass running through their veins, so they each gravitated toward the other? I found it surprising, really, considering his criminal background. He had explained that all the charges ever brought against them had been dropped. Apparently, Amber either believed him, or she thought it wasn't worth arguing about.

With the brothers in the kitchen, I went over and hugged Amber. I rested my chin on her head and then whispered in her ear. "I missed you today."

She hugged me back. "You always miss me."

"Mmmm. That's true." We kissed then, enjoying our end of day reunion.

"Oh dude! Get a room!" Dean said as he headed out to the deck with some brauts.

"Hey, _dad_, this is my house! _You_ get a room!" I grinned at Amber and let her go.

"I did! You're standing in it!"

"Oh? You lose at rock, paper, scissors again?"

"Har har. Bring me a beer, boy..." Dean started to mess with the grill.

As I went to fetch a couple brews, Sam laughed. "When doesn't he lose? Too bad too, your guest room bed is extremely comfortable."

Sam made sure to say that loud enough for Dean to hear out on the deck, to which we heard in response, "Bitch!"

"Jerk!"

We all laughed and just enjoyed each others easy company while we got our meal together.

During dinner, Sam and Dean regaled us with some of their stories. I particularly liked the one where they were pranking each other. I'll have to keep the itching powder in the boxers in mind for future use. Amber, I could tell, wasn't sure what to make of some of the monster related stories. I think she still thinks Dean and Sam are full of crap.

Our discussion continued after dinner, in the living room. Sam sprawled out on the floor, hands folded under his head. Dean, Amber and myself got comfy on the couch and chair.

"So, what brought you guys here? You just visiting, or what?" I asked some time later.

"Well no. We came about the vampires, obviously." Dean said.

Amber immediately let go with a laugh and then quickly covered her mouth with her hand. "Seriously? You came about vampires? Vampires are real?"

"Just as real as the ghouls Ben helped us take down in New York." Dean looked at me, questioningly, and then back to Amber.

Sam sat up, then and looked at us.

"Ghouls. Ghouls? What the hell are you talking about?" Amber was still smiling, but I could see it begin to waver.

"You _did_ tell her about the ghouls, right, Ben?" Sam questioned with one of his signature frowns firmly in place.

"Uhh..."

"Ben? What are they talking about?" Amber turned her piercing gaze on me.

"What the hell, Ben! Why wouldn't you tell her that?" Dean sat forward in his chair, hands open, waiting for my excuse.

"Okay. Everyone calm down. I didn't tell her because one: I didn't think she'd believe me and two: I don't know what the hell I saw out there myself!"

Dean stood up then. "You know damn well what you saw, Ben. You're not crazy and neither are we. You need to tell her this stuff, man! How can she be safe if she doesn't have the know how?" He started to pace around the room, running his hands through his hair.

"Ben? Something you wanna tell me?"

I sighed, running my hand down my face. So I gave her the short version, leaving the horrid details of most of our torture out of it, for Dean's sake. When I was done, Amber just sat there, searching my eyes. I don't know if she was looking for signs of a joke or not. What she found was honesty, confusion, maybe some regret.

"So. Vampires, is it?" She finally said.

We all just looked at each other in confusion. "That's it? That's all you got after that?" I was at a loss.

"What else were you expecting? I can see the honesty in your face, Franken-Ben." She leaned over and kissed my cheek. "I have no reason to doubt what you say happened other than to think you've caught the crazy. But say, just for one moment, that what you guys have been telling us IS true... I find it more worth my while to believe you and thus prepare myself accordingly, than to not believe you and find myself dead at the hands of some vamp that I was too stupid to believe in. Logic dictates that it's better to be prepared for something that may not happen than to be foolishly unprepared for something when it comes your way."

Again we all just looked dumbfoundedly at each other.

"Marry her." Dean said after a time.

Sam laughed at that and shook his head. He looked to be remembering something, some memory perhaps.

"Okay, then... so... vampires..." I looked at Dean and Sam. Dean settled back into the chair.

That brought Sam into his element. I found he reveled in the professor role. You could almost see him cracking his mental knuckles. "Vampires, real ones, don't have your Hollywood two fangs. So, naturally, people don't see their bites and think 'oh! It's a vampire'. They have a whole set of nasty teeth that descend out of their gums when they want to feed. Right Dean?" Sam looks at his brother and grins.

"Oh, hilarious! I wouldn't have vamped out if your soulless ass would have jumped in and done something!"

"My soulless ass didn't care. But I do now. You wanna hug?"

"Shut up, bitch." Dean sighed, grinned and shook his head. "What Sammy is saying, is I once got turned into a bloodsucker. Definitely ranks on my top 10 things to NOT do in a lifetime or two."

"Wait, wait! How could you have been a vampire? Wouldn't that make you dead? I don't think I've ever heard of a way back from that..." I asked.

"Well that's because everything you've _heard_ comes from movies. IF you can catch a person before they've tasted human blood, there is a potion you can whip up to counteract the vampire venom, so to speak. Going through Vamp detox...also on the top 10 things not to do. That potion smelled like ass and made me puke til I didn't think I could puke anymore."

"So, you guys are saying we have a vampire on our hands? Here? In the city?" I couldn't wrap my head around this one. Ghouls for some reason were okay. I'd never really heard of them, but vampires? They are the stuff of nightmares and Saturday afternoon monster movies.

"Actually," Sam answered, "probably a nest. Not just one. Far too many killings for just one."

"Huh. I guess that makes sense, since our witness said there were four guys. They wouldn't hang out with non vampires, would they?"

"Not unless they were saving them for a midnight snack." Dean said.

"Okay so a nest of four?" Amber asked.

Sam frowned, thinking. "Probably not. The leader of the group may or may not stay at the nest. They tend to send the lackies out to do the dirty work."

"So the missing persons were just brought back to him, for what? So he could feed, or whatever?" It was my turn to get up and pace around the room. It helped me think.

"Yes and no." Dean said this time. "When I was vamped out, they had brought people to the nest in the hopes of changing them. Not all of those brought back were dinner."

"Wait. Change them? You mean, into vampires?" Amber was starting to really get into this.

"Yeah. All it takes to change someone, is for them to either ingest a vamp's blood by mouth, or, get blood to blood contact. Say, vamp blood into an open wound. When I was changed, the vamp bit open his own wrist and smeared his blood all over my mouth. Nasty. Thanks again, Sammy."

"Anytime." Sam grinned at Dean. "So your nest could be doing either. Changing them or eating them."

"How do you kill them? Stake to the heart?"

"That's Hollywood cliché. Only way to kill them is to take off their head." Dean said this while running his finger along his throat in a cutting motion.

"Awesome." I said. Disgusted. "How am I supposed to get Tom on board with hunting vampires?"

"You don't." Dean said. "You go about your business and we'll go about ours."

* * *

**AN: Sorry this one took a bit...the muse has gone on hiatus without me! I enjoyed writing a bit of nostalgic Sam & Dean in this chapter. Hope you enjoy!**


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: Then: Last chapter Amber learned about vamps and took it pretty well. Ben is not enthused about chopping heads off...  
Now:**

* * *

The next morning I was tip toeing through the living room on the way to the kitchen, being careful not to wake Dean. Imagine my surprise when I came upon him sitting at the kitchen table on Sam's laptop. He quickly slapped the computer closed as I came in.

"You're up." I observed.

"Never down."

"How do you function without sleeping?"

"Been doing fine for years, now. Anyway, I get sleep, occasionally."

"You still having nightmares?"

He didn't answer and that was answer enough. After our dealings with the ghouls in New York, he had started having nightmares. He didn't tell me that, of course. I got the story from Sam. Not only were the nightmares regarding his torture at ghoul hands, but the incident dredged up memories he thought he'd buried. Nightmares of Hell, Purgatory, people he'd lost over the years, all came flooding in. It's no wonder he goes on so little sleep.

"So...tonight Amber and I are going to see my friend's band. You and Sam are more than welcome to come along. They're playing at the club La Rue at 10pm."

"Hey, sounds good. Me and Sammy got some stuff to do today, but we'll meet you guys there."

Amber walked in then, wearing one of my dress shirts as pajamas. She had just crawled out of bed and was coming in for her morning coffee. She walked right past Dean and I at the table and straight to the coffee maker at the counter. Dean watched her like a hawk. Taking in her short, yet curvy legs. She finished getting her coffee and headed back to the bedroom, never even acknowledging us. Dean leaned out of his chair to watch her go. I shoved him, hard, and he tumbled out of his chair.

"Hey!"

"Hey, what? You mind not ogling my girl, _dad_?!"

He pulled himself back up into his chair. "Just admiring the female form, kid." He had the audacity to wink at me.

"Yeah, well, even though I'll admit she does have a fine form, could you keep your wolfish glares off of her?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, yeah."

* * *

We each went about our morning routines and headed off in our respective directions. Work was uneventful, for once, and I took my time doing some old paperwork and looking over the descriptions of our four suspects, provided by Becca.

We had one african-american with a shaved head and some sort of 'tribal looking' tattoo on his upper arm. One guy that looked like a body builder. Dark brown, long hair, pulled back into a ponytail. Becca described him as one of those guys that has so much muscle, he has no neck. The other two sounded like your average college guys. Short brownish-blond hair that was gelled and somewhat spikey. No tattoos or piercings that she could remember. Not really helpful, except for the muscle bound guy. He might stand out a bit more than some.

Because of the relative quiet of the day, Amber and I were able to slip out and get lunch together. We walked down the block to a little place that had outdoor seating. She ordered a salad and I had a chicken ranch wrap and fries.

"So, quiet day, huh?" She asked.

"Yeah. It's nice for once." I winked at her and smiled.

"What do you think your father and uncle are up to?"

"Lord knows. Out trolling for vampires, I suppose."

"In the daytime? Doesn't the sun fry them or something?"

"Umm." I tried to recall everything they had told me about vampires. It seemed like ages ago. "I think they can go in the sun, but they don't like it. They will avoid it if they can. Maybe they think if they can stumble upon the nest during the day, they can nip this right quick."

"More power to them. I hope they are successful."

I raised my eyebrows at her. "Really. You know, I have to say, I'm somewhat shocked at how well you've taken all this. Weren't you the one who was telling me these guys are crazy killers?"

She set her fork down and thought for a minute. "I don't know how to describe it. I did used to think that way, but once I met them...I don't know. They seem to really want to help people. They don't look for thanks or payment. I guess when you learn their character, then what they do or how they get there, doesn't seem to matter as much. I know this doesn't make any sense. It certainly doesn't make much sense in my head."

I laughed. "It makes perfect sense. It explains very much how I felt when I first met them. There's just something about them that you can't put your finger on. That, and you're in love with my dad."

She looked at me with a shocked expression. "What?"

"I'm teasing. You two are like two peas in a pod, sometimes, it's hilarious. And he thinks you have great legs and a great ass."

"Oh really? He told you this?"

"He doesn't need to. I already know it, but I did catch him checking you out this morning and gave him what for."

She looked confused. "This morning?" She was trying to think back. "Oh God. My morning coffee run. I forgot all about him being in the living room!"

"You were pretty out of it this morning, sweets. We were both sitting at the kitchen table."

"You were not!" She cringed. "You were?"

I laughed and just continued eating. I'm sure I'll pay for this, but the lovely shade of pink it brought to her cheeks was just so adorable. We finished our lunch, talking about unimportant things, and then went back to work.

The rest of the day passed in a haze. I'm not sure I could even tell you what I did all afternoon. That evening, was Austin's concert, and we got ourselves ready for an evening out. Amber wore a pair of tight black jeans tucked into what looked like old army boots and a blouse over a tank top. She always got to dancing at these concerts and over heating. By the time we come home, she'll be down to just the tank top. I, on the other hand, wore jeans, my boots and a black tee that was nice and snug. I wore my shoulder holster over that and then my dark blue Carhart jacket on top.

As we were leaving, Dean called to say they were already there and had a table reserved. He also complimented La Rue on having waitresses that were easy on the eyes. We decided to ride my bike, since it was a warm evening. Amber loved it.

Unfortunately, we never made it to the concert. Friday nights can be pretty busy in the club district. We had to park the bike almost a full block away. As we were walking down toward La Rue, I saw a movement in the alley to my left. I glanced over and saw, just at the edge of a circle of light cast by a security lamp, what appeared to be someone hunched down over something. When I looked closer, that something turned out to be a person laying sprawled on the concrete.

I hustled Amber past the alley and then stopped her. "Stay here and call 911, tell them an officer needs assistance at this address."

She looked at me confused, but didn't question me. She took out her phone and started to dial as I made my way into the alley, along the wall, staying in the dark. I pulled my gun, clicking off the safety. I got to a dumpster about forty feet away and stopped. The guy was definitely up to no good. I could see that he was holding the head of the prone person up and appeared to be sucking at their neck.

I raised my gun and stepped out from behind the dumpster. "This is the police. Stop what you're doing, get your hands where I can see them, and slowly stand up."

The sucking sounds stopped and he lowered the head to the ground. He was very still for a moment and then slowly raised his hands up, looking at me back over his shoulder. If he was one of our guys, I'd peg him as one of the spikey haired college guys.

He slowly stood up and turned toward me. I moved closer. About twenty feet now. In the dim light of the security lamp, I could see what appeared to be blood smears around his mouth and on his cheeks.

"Don't move."

He takes a couple steps closer, takes a deep breath through his nose, and then practically growls at me, showing a mouthful of wicked looking teeth. Each tooth coming to a sharp point. I back up a step as he comes another step closer.

"I said don't move!"

He looks as if he's getting ready to spring on me. "One more step and I _will_ fire! Now freeze!" I never thought, in my life, I would ever utter the word freeze, but there it was.

He did spring then. Started running right at me. It didn't take long at all for him to close the distance between us. It all happened so fast. Just as he got to me, I fired my weapon. It was point blank into his chest. Just as I fired he reached out and shoved me backwards. His strength was other worldly. I flew through the air and I mean actually flew. He shoved me up and back hard enough, that my feet grazed the top of the dumpster that was to my back. I turned, some, as I went, and slammed shoulder first into the brick wall behind me. I dropped to the ground, twisting my ankle when I landed.

"Ben!"

I could hear Amber scream my name. "Stay back!" I yell.

I struggle to my feet, my right arm hanging painfully useless at my side. I scan the area around me. The perp is no where to be seen. How could he have possibly survived? I put a bullet in his chest! I hobbled over to the person lying prone on the ground. I could hear sirens in the distance, rapidly getting closer. The man was still alive, but struggling. Blood was flowing much too fast from the wound on his neck. I tried shrugging out of my jacket, but couldn't manage with my arm, so I just put my bare hand right on his neck, trying to stem the flow.

"Amber! Get an ambulance here on the double!" I yelled.

"Already done." She said, bending down next to me. She had taken off her blouse and put it down over my hand, applying her own pressure to the wound. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. Nothing serious. Damn it, where's that ambulance!?"

The man started to move his mouth like he was trying to speak.

"Shh, shh. Don't talk. Calm down. We've got you now." Amber spoke in a soothing tone. She ran her free hand back through his hair, much like a mother would do for a sick child, trying to calm him down.

"Everybody back away! Come on! Move back!" Voices came from the mouth of the alley. Backup had arrived. I could hear running footsteps.

I looked up as two paramedics came around to the other side of the victim and got down to business. They got the details of his injuries from me, slowly pulled our hands away, and got to work.

"Ben! … Ben! Are you okay?" Tom came running up. "You look like shit, man, what've you been doing?"

"It was one of our perps, Tom. Caught him in the act. I swear I shot him point blank as he rushed me, but he's no where to be seen." He put an arm around me, supporting my weight as I made my way slowly to the waiting ambulance.

"Damn it, Ben. Now you're going to have a ton of paperwork for discharging your weapon. Especially since you have no victim to show for it."

"Well he has a witness." Amber spoke up. "I saw the whole thing. It shouldn't take too long to fill it out."

They helped me sit on the back step of the ambulance. Tom took my official statement while we waited for a free paramedic to look me over.

"Wait! What did his teeth look like?" Tom looked at me incredulously.

"I'm telling you...a whole mouth full of wicked... long... pointy... teeth! It was freakish!"

"Huh. Okay. Well I guess that explains the condition of the necks on all our victims. And you saw all of this, Amber?" He turned to Amber who was watching the paramedics down the alley.

"What? Oh, yeah. Saw it all, except the teeth. I wasn't close enough for that kind of detail. Ben told him several times to stop moving and told him if he got any closer, he would shoot. The guy rushed him. When they collided, Ben's gun was literally touching the guy's chest when it went off. Then Ben went flying and the guy turned and ran back down the alley. He turned a corner and disappeared."

Tom motioned some uniforms over, gave them some orders and they took off down the alley, to look for any signs of our perp.

Just then one of the paramedics came up and talked quietly to Tom. Tom rubbed a hand down his face, nodded his head and pulled out his phone. He turned his back to us and made a call. I looked down the alley. The suspect had been covered with a drape. _Damn it._

The paramedic turned to me and looked me up and down. "Okay, let's have a look at you, huh? What happened?"

"Guy threw me into a wall. Hit shoulder first and landed wrong on my ankle."

He moved my arm around a bit, feeling at the shoulder.

"Son of a bitch!" I grimaced.

"Sorry. Dislocated shoulder. Not a pleasant injury. When Sal comes back, we'll see if we can right it without a trip to the hospital for you." He crouched down then and started looking over my ankle. "The ankle, on the other hand, may require a visit to the hospital. It's swelling up pretty good. Probably should do some x-rays, just to be sure."

"Great..." I turned to Amber then. "Shit! Austin! He's going to be pissed we missed his show."

Amber rubbed my other shoulder. "I think he'll understand, given the circumstances. I think, though, if you're okay here, that I'll go down to the club and check on our guests. I'm sure they'll want to know what happened." She gave me a pointed look and I nodded my head.

"Tom?" Amber tapped his shoulder to get his attention.

He covered his phone with his hand and turned. "Yeah?"

"If you don't need me, we were to be meeting some people at the club down the road. I'd like to go down and meet up with them, so they don't start to worry."

"Yeah. Sure. I'll escort you. Don't want you walking down there alone."

"Thanks, Tom." I said, smacking his arm with my good hand, only realizing after doing so that my left hand was covered in sticky blood from the victim.

"Seriously, Braeden?" I looked sheepishly at him and shrugged which pulled a gasp of pain from me. He grinned at my discomfort and headed off down the street with Amber.

Dean and Sam appeared on the scene about five minutes later. My arm was in a sling and I had been loaded up into the ambulance for my trip to get x-rays. Dean, I mean Agent Dresden, popped his head into the back and asked to speak with me privately before they left.

"You okay, kid?"

"I'll survive. I think it was a vampire, Dean."

"Sam's looking at your victim, now. What makes you think so?"

"A mouth with more fangs than it should possibly be able to hold...munching and sucking on the victim's neck?"

"Sounds about right. You're lucky you got away with just the injuries you received. What were you thinking going in there alone?"

"I was thinking I was doing my job, _dad_! There was someone in trouble and no one around to help them. How was I supposed to know it was freaking dracula!"

"Settle down, settle down. Chip of the ol' block is what you are. Take it easy and let the professionals take care of it from here on out." He patted my arm, causing me to cry out.

"Har har." I said, sarcastically.

He chuckled and hopped down out of the ambulance. "Don't be a pansy."

* * *

**AN: Reviews would be great...let me know how I'm doing. Hope you have enjoyed the story so far...things are about to get a bit steamy in the next chapter! **


	6. Chapter 6

The Sarge made me take some time off to recuperate. My ankle wasn't broken, just a bad sprain. They wanted me to stay off it for a few days, though, and with my arm in a sling, I wasn't much use in the field. I guess he had a point. I just hated sitting around the house. I felt useless. Currently I lay on my bed, hands folded up on top of my head. It felt good to have my arm up like that. I hated the sling, anyway. My ankle was up on a pillow and Amber was no where to be seen.

I had slept like this and when I awoke she wasn't in bed. I looked over at the clock...almost 10:30. She let me sleep late. Not unusual for some Saturdays. I was going stir crazy already and my medical leave was barely an hour in!

So, to occupy my mind, I started going over the case in my head. This time, though, I looked at every crime scene with the thought of vampires doing the deeds. It all made perfect sense, now. Why the blood was missing, wounds only to the neck. Still not sure about the missing persons though. Two so far. One male and one female. Dean had mentioned possibly changing them into vampires too. I hope not. Look at the trouble just four are causing our city.

There's also the possibility that there is a boss of some sort back at their hideout, or nest as Dean and Sam call it. If so, then what's his game? He must have some sort of plan. I mean, to my knowledge, we haven't had a vampire problem before. So why all of a sudden?

"Hey."

I come out of my head to see Amber leaning against the door frame of our bedroom in another of my dress shirts. "Hey, yourself. Where are the guys?"

"Oh they left hours ago. Just you and me. So, how's the shoulder and ankle today?" She came over and lay on the bed next to me, propping her head up on an elbow.

"The ankle has a dull throbbing, but the shoulder actually feels kind of good up like this. Do I smell pancakes?" I look over at her surprised.

"Yes you do! I've been practicing on your father and uncle. I think I've perfected it. I have some keeping warm in the oven, wasn't sure if you were awake yet." She started to trace lazy patterns across my chest.

"Mmm."

"Your mind seems to be preoccupied, Franken Ben." She got up then and turned on her MP3 player on the dresser. Her favorite song was playing. Crazy Love by Jason somebody.

I smile at her. "I guess so. I hate being cooped up in the house like this. The only thing for me to do is think. I might go crazy."

She returns to the bed and continues to trace designs on me. "There are other things you could do...but...I wouldn't want you to aggravate your injuries."

"You are such a tease." I started to reach for her with my good arm.

"Ah ah ah. Don't move. I don't want you hurt any more than you are. You just lie still."

I frown at her and put my hand back on top of my head. What was she up to? "Amber, I..."

She put her finger to my lips, shushing me. She kept tracing the lazy designs across my chest and down across my abs. She leaned in and licked my nipple and started spreading kisses across my chest and up my neck. She nibbled up my jaw and tugged on my earlobe with her teeth. I couldn't stand it. I reached down and she sat up and smacked my hand.

"Ow!"

"Benjamin Isaac Braeden. I told you not to move. Do I need to spank you?" She grinned down at me.

"Yes?" I laughed. She pouted at me. "Okay, fine. I'll play it your way. But I can't guarantee I won't move."

"You better not. I don't want to hurt you."

I chuckled. "I don't think you could really...OW! You bit my nipple!"

"I _can _hurt you, see? So behave..."

"Mmm, yes ma'am." I grinned at her.

She straddled my stomach and leaned in to kiss me. I tried, I really did, but I almost immediately reached for her hair. She sat up quickly when she felt my hand and cocked an eyebrow at me.

"Sorry, but you are an irresistible tease."

She kept giving me the look. "Do I need to get your cuffs?" She put her hands on her hips.

I pursed my lips in thought.

"Ben!" She laughed and smacked my chest.

"Ugh! Okay! But you have no idea the amount of self restraint this requires."

"Well I'll start out at the novice level, then..." She leaned down again and started kissing me. She tugged on my bottom lip with her teeth and explored my mouth with her tongue. I groaned. I wanted to squeeze her to me and feel her weight on me. She giggled. She actually giggled.

"You're enjoying this aren't you?"

"Oh, you have no idea." She leaned in again and nibbled my chin. "You truly take after your father." She licked up along my jawline. "You like to be in control of every situation." She tugged and sucked on my earlobe and I groaned again. "That's okay, don't get me wrong, but I find it really hot to get you under _my_ control, for once." She sprinkled kisses across my forehead and eyebrows. She kissed my closed eyes. "I think I like this."

I bit my lip and groaned. She was killing me.

"I think you're doing pretty well, detective. Maybe we should move beyond the novice level, yes?"

She sat up then, letting her hands run down my face and chest as she went. She never broke eye contact as she slowly started unbuttoning the shirt she was wearing. She started at the bottom, furthest from the sweets hidden behind the fabric.

I groaned again and grabbed handfuls of my own hair, trying to keep from reaching out and ripping the shirt from her body. She gave me a sly little grin. Finishing with the last button, she held the shirt closed, revealing nothing.

"Agh! You're killing me!"

She grinned again and slowly slid the shirt down off her one shoulder, but continued holding it closed over her breasts. She then slid it down off her other shoulder. _You know, two can play at this game_... I suddenly bucked my hips up and she threw her hands out to my chest to keep from falling. There they were! I licked my lips, grinning at her.

"Oh you will pay for that, mister, one way or another. Now knock it off...this is my show."

"Oh good god, woman! If there were awards for biggest tease, you'd win!"

"Why thank you! Let's see if I can win it by a landslide, huh?"

"Oh shit. What have I created?"

She sat back up and let out a little growl. She again took a hold of her shirt and slowly slid it down to her waist. Oh God, but she was beautiful! She wiggled out of the shirt and tossed it in the corner of the room. She bit her lip and reached up and rubbed her breasts. She played with her nipples, flicking them, pinching them.

"Stop. Stop!"

"What's wrong, honey? Don't like what you see?"

"Oh God! Yes, yes! You win! By a landslide! Can I move now?" I was itching to get my hands and mouth on those beautiful breasts.

"Nope! You can move when it's time to eat my wonderful...pancakes."

"Son of a bitch, woman, you're horrible!"

"And you love it!"

I rolled my eyes up into my skull and groaned again. When I looked again, she was playing with her breasts again and licking her lips. She reached out and put her hands on either side of my head and slowly moved up to kiss me again. Evil woman let her breasts slowly glide up my chest causing gooseflesh to prickle up my arms and down my legs. My cock was aching with the sensation. Bless her, she finally lay her weight on me and kissed me roughly. Taking my mouth under her control as she had the rest of me.

As she dominated my mouth, she hooked her toes into the top waistband of my boxer briefs and slowly slid them down my legs as far as hers would reach. To finish the job, she slowly crawled backwards down my body, again letting her breasts play down my skin. I was gripping the hair on my head so tightly that, if I wasn't careful, I would have bald patches when this was over.

Being careful of my ankle, she removed my underwear and it joined her shirt in the corner. She started to crawl back up my body but stopped in front of my cock, which was practically begging for attention.

"Have you been working out, detective?" She asks, running a finger ever so gently down the side of my dick and cupping my balls.

"Oh god, yes."

She chuckled low, under her breath. "It shows. You're so...firm." She reached up and rubbed my abs and chest firmly with her hands, then, and took me in her mouth.

I threw my head back and gasped. I swear I could feel her smile around my cock. She did things with her tongue down there that shouldn't be legal.

She sat up and smiled at me. "You are showing amazing amounts of restraint, detective. I think we should take this to the expert level."

She stood up on the bed then, still straddling me. She ever so slowly inched her pink, lace panties down her thighs. She stopped there and ran her hand down, playing with herself a bit, throwing her own head back and sighing.

"Amber...please!"

"Mmm, no, baby. No moving..." She looked down at me with hooded eyes and a self satisfied grin. She worked her panties off the rest of the way, kicking them to the corner with her toe. She stayed standing above me for a moment just looking at me. She pinched her nipples again with one hand and reached down to pleasure herself again with the other. "I like this, baby. When you're all better, I might just get those cuffs out after all."

"Agh! Not just Queen of the Lab...Queen of the Tease! Please, Amber, PLEASE!" My cock was throbbing and I wanted her now! I started wiggling on the bed. I couldn't help it. My hips were thrusting the air involuntarily.

"Okay, since you asked so nicely..."

She lowered herself to the bed and slowly slid down onto me drawing a gasp from me. She smiled at the control she had over me. I hate to admit it, but I loved the control she had over me too. She started to slowly grind up and down, reaching behind her and rolling my balls in her hand as she did so. I gasped again and my good arm flew down to the bed, grabbing a fistful of the sheets.

"Oh my. You moved." She stopped moving then.

I looked at her and pleaded with my eyes. She grinned at me, arching an eyebrow.

"God, woman, you're incorrigible!" I put my hand back to my head and she started her slow grind again.

As she pumped up and down, she continued to play with her breasts, licking her lips, closing her eyes and enjoying herself. I started to thrust my hips in time with her and she didn't complain. She bent down then, putting her hands on my chest. Her breath was coming in short gasps. She was getting close and I didn't know how much longer I'd be able to hold out.

"Okay!" She gasped. "Now."

With that I reached down and wrapped her in my good arm and rolled her under me. I started kissing and sucking on her breasts and thrust harder and faster into her. This had turned from tease to need. She was gasping and arching her back beneath me. I peaked and gasped, throwing my head back. She came right behind, calling out my name. Her legs wrapped around my waist and squeezed. Her muscles rippled along my cock with her orgasm, causing me to cry out incoherently.

After a time, I lowered my self to her side, no longer able to hold my weight off of her with only my one arm. We were panting like we had run a marathon.

"Oh God, Ben...I am SO getting a separate set of cuffs for the bedroom."

We laughed and dozed off wrapped in each other's arms, vampires and pancakes forgotten.

* * *

**AN: Hope you enjoyed that little respite from the story! Things will begin to pick up soon in the case...**


	7. Chapter 7

"I think we should go back." Dean said.

"What? Why?" Sam glanced over at his brother. They had been scouring the city's abandoned buildings, looking for any sign of the vampire nest. They've had zero luck. "We still have the whole east side to check out, yet."

"I'm beginning to think Ben has become the key to all this."

"Ben? How so?"

Dean checked his mirrors and pulled the car to the side of the road, popping it into park. He turned in his seat, looking at Sam. "Because Ben caught one of them in the act."

Sam thought for a second. "You think they'll go after him. To get rid of the loose end, the witness."

"Makes sense, doesn't it?"

"I suppose, if I were them, that's what I would probably do. They have his scent now, too."

"Exactly." Dean and Sam both knew that once a vampire got your scent, they never forgot it. If they wanted to, they could hunt Ben down for the rest of his days. "So, I'm thinking we should be keeping an eye on Ben."

"Isn't that kind of like using your own son as bait?" Sam looked at him skeptically.

"No 'kind of' about it." Dean answered without missing a beat. "But think about it. If they are going to go after him, the best place to be is with him. Anyway, he has a bum arm and a bum ankle. He'll be easy prey if they do show up. We need to be there to protect him."

Sam nodded his head. "Yeah, sure." He could see the unspoken worry in his brother's eyes.

Dean put the car back on the road and headed back toward Ben's place. "I'll go in when we get there and you stay out in the car. We can switch off every couple hours."

"Sure." Sam wasn't going to argue with him. It was his son and he was going to do this his way, regardless of anything Sam had to say.

Dean parked out on the road to give Sammy a broader view of the house and surrounding area. He went back to the trunk and tossed a couple large knives in a duffle bag. He didn't want to be seen by the neighbors walking up to the house in broad daylight carrying weapons. Wouldn't do to have the neighbors calling the cops. When he felt he was sufficiently armed, he closed the trunk and went around to give the keys to Sammy.

"Keep your eyes open and call me if you see anything."

Sam nodded his head and slid over to the driver's seat.

Dean decided to do a quick canvass of the backyard before going in. Ben's property wasn't overly large. It had six foot high privacy fencing running down the sides and a row of some sort of bushes along the back. It was all quiet. He let himself in through the sliding door from the deck.

He hadn't even shut the door when he heard a cry from down the hall. He was afraid they may be too late already. He hadn't thought they would have come in broad daylight. He pulled his gun from his waistband and quietly hurried into the hall and then, just as quickly, turned tail and made his way back out onto the deck. He chuckled, mentally giving Ben a high five, and settled into a lounge chair on the deck.

The day went slowly. Dean and Sam switched off a few times. Amber went to the grocery store. Around 4pm Dean spotted some movement in the backyard. He headed to the backdoor where he heard a scrape on the door itself. Holding his knife at the ready Dean whipped the door open. There was a guy there, who smelled like he hadn't showered for a few days. His clothes were a mess and had several blood stains. He was definitely startled by Dean's sudden appearance. Dean smelled vamp but there was something off about this guy.

"Ben's sick and can't come out to play." Dean said, raising his knife.

"I...ah..."

The guy really didn't know what to do. He seriously looked at a loss. What kind of vamp was this? He suddenly shoved Dean back into the house and took off back through the yard. By the time Dean untangled himself from the kitchen chairs and got outside, the guy was gone. He searched through the whole yard and called Sam. He hadn't seen anyone.

Inside, Dean set his knife on the coffee table and sat down in the living room where Ben was laid up on the couch. He called Sam on his cell to get him in on the conversation.

"What was that all about? Who was it?" Ben asked.

"Well, he was definitely a vampire...but I've never seen one act like that before. He seemed skittish; nervous. I don't know I just can't put my finger on it."

"Do you think maybe he hasn't fed yet?" Sam asked from the cell.

"No." Dean answered. "He had way too much blood all over his clothes to not have fed."

"Was he one of our four suspects?" Ben asked.

"Ah, black wild hair, brown pants, green jacket? Sound like one of them?"

"Black hair? Hmmm no." Ben made a duckface as he thought, which made Dean chuckle. He was glad Sam wasn't there to see it. He'd never let him live it down.

"What about your missing persons?" Sam inquired.

"Missing persons?" Ben frowned. "You know I never got that guy's description. I'm sure I can access it on my computer though." Ben grabbed his loaner crutch and started making his way over to his desk.

Dean got up and paced around the room a bit, talking to Sam. "I don't like this, Sam. If it is one of the new converts...was he sent here? Did he get loose? If he got loose why come here?"

"He had to have been sent. I see no other reason for him to have come otherwise."

"Well, he makes a piss poor vampire. Stay on your toes, Sammy. With the dark, they may up their game and send a more seasoned member of the nest to take care of things."

Dean hung up and set his phone next to the knife on the table. He wandered over and looked over Ben's shoulder. "Any luck?"

"The computer's still starting up. Hey you need something for that?" Ben turned at looked at Dean.

"Huh?"

"An ice pack? Heating pad? Tylenol?" Ben nodded towards Dean's arm.

"Uh, no. Why?"

"You've been rubbing your arm, there, ever since you set your knife down. I assumed you had a pulled muscle or something."

Dean looked down at his right arm. He had been rubbing at the inner forearm without even realizing he had been doing it. "Oh, ah, just muscle memory, I guess."

"What?" Ben looked confused. He should be. Dean had never told him about the Mark of Cain business. Wasn't sure he wanted to either. It was just another thing on a long list of things he just didn't feel comfortable talking about.

"Let's just say I prefer to do my hunting with a gun these days."

The computer beeped behind Ben and he turned his focus back to the machine and off of Dean. Ben made his way through some various logins and eventually pulled up the missing persons file. "This your guy?"

Dean looked closely at the screen. "I think so. You add some dirt to his face and mess his hair up a bit, he's our man."

"So, the vamps are changing the kidnapped people into more vamps?"

"Looks that way. They may be trying to grow their ranks. Their nest is already four, maybe five, members strong. That's pretty average for what we've seen, but they can be larger. It's harder to keep their existence secret with that many mouths to feed, though."

The door to the garage opened, then, and Amber came in with some groceries. "I miss anything?"

* * *

**AN: Sorry this one took a while longer...we're into the season 9 final episodes and my mind has been preoccupied with the ever hot, yet troubled, Dean...**


	8. Chapter 8

That evening, Amber was going out with her girlfriends. Sam didn't like it. Dean didn't like it. I certainly didn't like it.

"Do you really need to do this?" I ask.

"Baby, there will be five of us. I think we can handle it." Amber said. She had that whole vibe going that declared 'I'll do what I want and you can't stop me'.

I sighed, maybe even growled a bit under my breath. "I just... I just don't think it's safe."

"I know you don't, but if we let every baddie out there scare us, then we've already let them win." She looked at me intently and took my good hand in hers. "Listen, I've talked to the girls about all the crazy shit going on and they've agreed. No men. We will travel as a pack and no one is going home with any strange guys tonight. Just us ladies, out having a good time. Is that okay?"

I squeezed her hand tightly in mine. She smiled because she knew she had won.

"I'll go with them." Sam offered, having come inside for dinner.

I was surprised. I thought a night at a club with a bunch of women sounded more like Dean's kind of thing. Dean raised his eyebrows at his brother.

"That way you can stay here and look out for Ben and I'll keep an eye on Amber."

"I'm a grown-ass woman and I don't need a chaperone." She crossed her arms over her chest and shot daggers at Sam.

"How about if I sit alone on the other side of the club?"

She continued her stare down.

"Babe, please?" I pleaded. "For me?" She turned her stare on me but her look softened. " How about if he just sits in the car across the street?"

She thought for a moment and then turned back to Sam. "Fine. Since you all are kind enough to bestow on me the chance to go out with my girls, I suppose he can go. BUT, he stays outside, IN the car."

"Scouts honor." Sam said with a smile.

* * *

Sam left around 7pm, hoping to beat the evening club crowds and get a parking spot near the club Amber had told him about. He only had to cruise the street for about ten minutes before he scored a spot directly across from the club.

As Sam looked at it, from the car, the club attached to a couple businesses on the right. To the left was a partial alley. It was fenced off part way back, not allowing any through traffic, pedestrian or car, but it still made Sam nervous. Beyond the alley were a couple more businesses and a coffee shop on the corner. Amber had said that she and the girls often ended their nights out at the coffee shop.

Since he had gotten there plenty early, he decided to walk down to the shop and load up. He also wanted a closer look at the partial alley next to the club.

After getting what seemed like a gallon of coffee, Sam stopped at the little alleyway, with his cell out. Pretending to text someone, he took a good look. It was only deep enough to allow maybe a garbage truck to park there, off the street. Other than the fence at the back, the only other thing there was a dumpster up against the left wall. It was flush with both wall and fence, leaving no real spots for anyone to hide. There was a padlocked door in the building next to the dumpster, otherwise, there was nothing to see.

Sam called Dean as he headed back to the car and filled him in. He had volunteered to do this to set Ben's mind at ease, but he really thought the threat lie with Ben, as Dean had suggested. Dean told him that, so far, all had been quiet at the house.

* * *

I decided on my heels, black leggings and jade colored, Asian styled sleeveless tunic. It had dragons and plum trees embroidered on it and was a birthday gift from Ben. I thought wearing it would make him feel a little bit better about my going out tonight. I put my hair up, twisting it around and holding it with a pair black chopsticks.

Sara was the designated driver tonight and arrived to pick me up about 9:30pm. The rest of the girls were already there. I was last on the route and squeezed into the back with the rest. There were cheerful greetings all around.

"How's that hunky man of yours?" Leigh asked.

I was the only one of us in any type of relationship and the girls always asked about Ben. "He got hurt on the job yesterday."

Gasps of shock and surprise surround me.

"Is he okay?"

"Oh no!"

"What happened?"

When it died down I answered. "He caught some guy in the act. There was an...altercation. Sprained his ankle pretty bad and dislocated his shoulder. He'll be fine, though."

"That's good to hear." said Sara. The disappointment clear in her voice. The girls always wanted me to dish on our sex life.

"Oh guys, don't get me wrong! He may not be very mobile, but he's still a great ride!" That was met with hoots and hollers.

"Do tell, Amber! Come on!" Emily pleaded.

"Let me say this...if you haven't thought of it already..."and I looked directly at a few of them who raised the curious eyebrows back at me, "might I suggest investing in a set of handcuffs...?"

"Amber!" Robin said with mock shock.

"Oh. My. God!" Sara shrieked from the front seat.

Emily and Marie just shared devious grins with each other. I could almost see the gears spinning in their heads. I was sure, before the night was over, one or both would ask me if I knew how to get my hands on a pair of cuffs for each of them.

When the laughter died down, Robin spoke up from the front. "Guys, tonight is a night of celebration."

"Oh really? You have news?" I asked.

Her face broke into a huge grin. "I got the promotion!"

We all cheered. Marie and Leigh leaned forward and gave their best attempt at hugging her from the backseat.

We arrived and got a parking spot next to our favorite coffee shop. The club was only a short walk down the street. I sent off a quick text to Uncle Sammy to let him know we had arrived and where we had parked. I made sure to remind him of our bargain and that he was to remain out in the car. He confirmed that he was clear on our deal.

The night was filled with much laughter, dancing and drinking. Even though I was adamant that Ben allow me to go out, his fear remained at the back of my mind. I wasn't stupid. I knew what was going on out here, even more so than my friends. Because of it, I didn't drink near as much as I might usually have. I made sure the girls never went anywhere in the club alone. We had talked about it, anyway, when we were making plans for this evening.

Around 1 am we decided to call it a night at the club and have our usual unwinding time down at the coffee shop. Because of all the clubs in the area, this particular shop stayed open 24 hours a day. It was a flurry of last minute trips to the bathroom, gathering coats, phones, and purses, but we finally made it out the door. We had just gotten past the alley when Sara had mentioned she'd left her coat at the club. I volunteered to go back with her and the rest went down to the next business because it had a bright light above the door. It never occurred to me to text Sam that we were leaving.


	9. Chapter 9

It's funny, the things that stick in your mind in a crisis. Weird things. I remember, as Sara and I came back past the alley, looking down the sidewalk and seeing Robin bend down and mess with the strap on her shoes. That scene is fried into my brain. I remember there was a white, delivery van parked in the alley and there was a muddy boot print on the back door of it, as if someone had had the door open and used their foot to kick it shut. I see a spot of blood on Sara's knee, glowing like a beacon, in the dim light of the night. After it was all said and done, those images are so startlingly clear in my mind.

As we passed the van, in a heartbeat, Sara had been shoved to the ground, and I was grabbed from behind. Two strong hands. One grabs my upper left arm, the other closes over my mouth. My eyes shoot to Sara who is struggling to sit up. She had been shoved down hard and has cut open her knee on the pavement, blood already starting to flow. I'm pulled back against a man's body and hastily dragged back into the alley, between the delivery van and the building. I glance up to my friends, who being further down the sidewalk, are already drawing out of sight. Just before they are completely out of view, Marie glances up and sees Sara on the ground.

The hands that hold me are strong and I feel as if my arm is already bruising under his grip. I reach up struggling to get a hold on his fingers, trying to pull them away from my mouth. I hear a door open in the building behind me and my eyes immediately search out the Impala and Sam across the street. All I see is the side of a large delivery truck, parked out on the road, it's four way flashers blinking in the night. Does Sam even know of the danger just beyond the truck? Does he even know we are out here? I feel my heart drop into my stomach when I realize I never texted him to inform him of our leaving.

I was dragged up through the doorway, turned around, and slammed into the wall inside. I quickly took in my surroundings. The man who had grabbed me was a large black man. He held me to the wall with the one hand over my mouth and his other shoving my right shoulder hard into the wall. The room was a small alcove with dirty light blue walls and a flickering florescent bulb above our heads. There was a stairwell leading up to my left and sitting on those steps was the man who had attacked Ben the other night.

"This the whore?" the one who held me asked, whom I started referring to as Goon One in my mind.

The other, Goon Two, came over and sniffed my hair. I tried to pull away from him, but there was no going anywhere. "Yeah, that's his woman. I can smell him all over her." he said.

He turned back to the steps, retrieving something. He came back up with a piece of duct tape. Oh god. I can't do this. I'm not strong enough for this shit. This is why I work in a lab! Yes, I'm full of bravado larger than my small frame. It's been the only way to get bullies and others to leave me the hell alone. But it's always been a show.

I start struggling with renewed effort, my fingernails clawing troughs into Goon One's arm and hand to no avail. He never even flinched. I raise my knee, intending for the classic groin shot, but he stands too close to me and there is no room. So I bring my heal down on his foot. Again, no reaction. Is this guy made of stone or what?

In one swift movement, he takes his hand from my mouth and his buddy slaps the tape in it's place. He uses his free hand to shove my other shoulder into the wall. The force is so strong and painful, I wonder if he's trying to push me right through it. Then he grabs my little purse that, amazingly, still hung from my right elbow, and yanks it free. His friend takes it, literally rips it open, and dumps it's contents across the floor, tossing the remains of the purse on the floor to join them.

For some reason, the sight of my things scattered across the floor makes me upset. I feel violated although nothing has really been done to my person. The lipstick tube slowly spinning to a stop, over by the stairs, just seems so wrong to me. That's not where it's supposed to be. It's supposed to be safe and snug in the confines of my purse. _I'm_ supposed to be safe and snug somewhere else. Not here with these strange men. I realize, then, that the one has said something to me and I turn my gaze back to them.

"I said to kick off your shoes, bitch." and he slaps my face so hard, tears spring to my eyes. His voice is so inconsistent with his behavior, it's disconcerting. He speaks low and quiet, even while threatening me and hitting me. He grabs my face and leans in close. "Do you hear me?"

I make a feeble attempt at nodding my head and kick my heals off to the side. Now the two goons tower over me even more. I hear an odd, somewhat whining sound, and realize it's coming from me. My nose is starting to stuff up with the crying, making breathing difficult. _Amber! Hold it together! There will be no Sam coming to the rescue. No Dean or Ben. You need to keep your shit together!_

Goon One grabbed my forearms and brought them down, slapping my hands together. Goon Two took his duct tape and started wrapping it around my hands, making them into a useless ball at the end of my arms. Then they tied some sort of blindfold around my head. That scared me more than anything else. The thought of not being able to see terrified me.

All of this activity lasted only a minute or two, tops. I heard the sounds of a cell phone. As I was led, I assume, back to the door, I heard Goon Two place a call. "Come and get her." He chuckled and then I heard the phone rattle against the floor.

Goon One got into some sort of vehicle and pulled me in after him. Goon Two slid in next to me, shoving me hard against the first one. The engine started and my heart raced with it. This was it. This is where I lose my friends and loved ones. I swung my hands in their makeshift club to my right, hoping to take one of them off guard. It was like a fly fending off a bear. I really had no chance. One of them pushed my head down to my knees. If breathing was difficult before, this position didn't make it any easier.

We pulled away and out onto the road. The vehicle swayed beneath me as we made the turn. They kept my head pushed down the whole time and I lost track of turns and time. I'm not sure if I fell asleep or passed out from lack of oxygen but I was jostled from the side and realized that the vehicle had come to a stop. I had no idea how much time had passed. I was pulled out and shoved forward. It was hard walking when I couldn't see. I tilted my head back, hoping to spot a crack in the blindfold. I spotted so little of the ground in front of me, that I couldn't even make out what I was seeing.

I heard a loud, metal grinding sound and was taken by the arm and dragged forward. My heart was racing. The lack of sight making every sound more horrible than it probably was. There was a sound of metal rattling on metal followed by a creak. I was pulled forward and shoved. I came up hard against what felt like chain link fence and the creak and metal rattling followed. I could only assume I had been locked up in some sort of cell. The loud metal grinding sounded again and then the sound of the vehicle driving away. All was quiet.

I struggled with my duct tape club hands to slide the blindfold up and off my face. After what seemed an eternity, I got it up and off. Looking around, I appeared to be inside a makeshift cell made of chain link fencing. The cell itself was located inside a large metal box. A shipping container, maybe, or a big rig trailer? There was a bare bulb dangling from the ceiling on a wire, casting faint light around the place. As I looked around I noticed another fenced cage at the back of the container. There was someone lying, unmoving, on the floor of it. Sleeping, I hoped.

I leaned back against the wall of my cage and slid to the floor. I tried to loosen the tape at my mouth with my hand-club, but it wasn't budging. The tears started again. I couldn't help it. I couldn't see how Ben would ever be able to find me. Even his father, with his brother, wouldn't be able to find me. I should never have gone out. They were right. I got myself into this shit and it was beginning to look like no one was going to be able to get me out of it.


	10. Chapter 10

It had been quiet all night. Dean felt like a caged animal. It was draining to stay sharp and focused hour after hour for nothing. Ben had gone to bed about an hour ago and Dean just paced the house, waiting. Sam had called a couple times to say that it was all quiet on his end as well. A little after 1 am, Ben's cell rang. He had left it on the coffee table. Dean picked it up and looked at the caller ID. Amber. Dean wasn't sure if he should answer it, it could be personal. Considering what was going on, though, he thought he'd risk it.

"Yeah. Ben's phone."

"Come and get her." Came a male voice over the line. Dean's eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Come and get who?... Hello?" There was nothing further and then a loud racket, as if whomever had been on the other end had dropped the phone. Dean waited, but the phone was never picked up again and the line went dead.

As he was puzzling over this, his own cell vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out. Sammy. "Tell me Amber is okay."

"You want me to lie?" Sammy asked.

"Damn it, Sam, what happened?"

"She never called or texted Dean. She was supposed to let me know when they were leaving. A delivery truck came and blocked my view. It was the second one of the night and since she hadn't contacted me, I didn't get out of the car to investigate. When it left, a delivery van, that had been parked in the alleyway for a bit, also left, going the opposite direction. No idea if they were together or not. Needless to say, when they were gone, and out of the way, I saw the girls on the sidewalk beyond. It looked like one of them was hurt, so I rushed over. Apparently, Amber and a friend had gone back to the club to retrieve a coat and when they came back through, the friend was shoved to the ground and Amber was snatched. The girls didn't see it happen and couldn't find Amber afterwards. The alley is clean, so I assume she had to be in one of those delivery vehicles. Damn it, Dean, I'm sorry."

"No, no. Sammy, she didn't contact you. You didn't know." Dean sighed and remembered Ben's cell. "Listen, stay on the line. I want to try something. Where are you?"

"Okay..." Sam didn't sound too sure. "I'm still on the sidewalk with the girls."

"Okay. Hold on." Dean hung up Ben's cell and dialed Amber's number. When it started ringing, he asked Sammy if he heard anything.

"Um yeah. I hear some music. Really quiet."

"Oh God. Follow it Sam, let me know what you find." It was quiet for a minute. Dean could hear Sam moving around.

"Shit."

"What, Sam?"

"Little doorway, that was padlocked earlier tonight, in the alley. Amber's cell and her purse, with contents, scattered all over inside."

"Son of a bitch. They got her, Sam. Tell those girls to skip the coffee and get home and then get your ass back here on the double."

Dean hung up and then worried about how to tell Ben he had let him down. He walked out of his life when he was kid and now he's messed it up again. Damn. Guess it was only a matter of time before Dean let Ben down in some way. This is what happened when he let people in. Eventually he screwed up and they got hurt.

He went in, woke up Ben, and told him the news. He now had to buy Amber a new lamp and alarm clock, but he thought he took it pretty well. Ben was hell bent on going out to look for her and it took Dean a while to talk him down.

"Ben! Damn it, man! What are you going to do out there, huh? You got a gimp leg and arm..."

"Quit reminding me about how useless I am! You don't think I know it?!"

"Dude, sorry, I'm just trying to get you to step back and look at this realistically. We have no idea where they went or even how they got her out of there. So cool your jets, get off the ankle and wait for Sammy to get here."

Ben dropped to the couch and let out a yell of frustration, anger, rage, maybe a bit of loss. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, closed his eyes, and rubbed his temples with his fingers. Dean let out a breath he didn't know he was holding, rubbed his face, and started pacing again.

Fifteen minutes later, Sam walked through the door and went straight for his laptop. He sat in a chair, propped it open on his lap and started tapping at it.

"Hey Sammy, you got something?"

"Well, on the drive back, I replayed it all in my head. I think the large delivery truck was just that. I mean, I watched the guy open up the back and deliver whole stacks of stuff to the club. I think the get away vehicle, if you will, was the delivery van in the alley. They only used the delivery truck as cover. So, first, I need to find out what kind of van it was and then, maybe Ben can get into the DMV and find out how many of them are running around the area."

"Hmm. It's a start."

Dean nodded at Ben who only clenched his jaw, making the tendons on his jawline pop and twitch. He looked like he was trying very hard to cooperate.

"Got it! A Ford Connect. It had a unique look to it. You think you can find out how many of these are licensed in the area, Ben?" Sam turned his laptop around to show a picture of the van and handed it to Ben.

Ben tapped at it for a while and then set the laptop down on the couch next to him. He got up, hobbled into the kitchen, let out another cry of rage and Dean and Sam heard something shatter. Sam ran into the kitchen and Dean leaned down to look at the computer. There was a message saying the site he was trying to get into was temporarily down for maintenance. Fuck technology, sometimes.

In the kitchen Ben had thrown a glass on the floor and then realized he was barefoot. Sam was sweeping up the mess when Dean walked in. Dean looked at Ben and Ben at Dean. The thoughts they conveyed without saying anything was profound. The worry, fear, rage, sadness...all of it was written across Ben's face. Along with a clear sense of helplessness. Ben looked at Dean and silently asked what he was supposed to do. In return, Dean gave him his best big brother look. Sammy had seen it a hundred times and, maybe, in this case, it was more of a father look. Dean told him to calm down, we'll figure this out, it's going to be okay, and most importantly, I'm here for you, I got you.

This exchange of thoughts, in a look, took only a minute. Ben took a deep shuddering breath and slowly let it out. He was barely keeping it together. His eyes glistened with unshed tears and the tendons in his jaw continued to twitch. Dean looked at Ben's hands. He was leaning back against the counter and he held onto the counter at his sides. His knuckles were white with the force of his grip.

"Okay. So DMV website, or whatever, is down. Probably for the night. I suggest we all get some sleep and tackle this in the morning. Ben, I know you want to be doing something, God do I know, but right now the best thing we can do is get some rest."

Sammy dumped his dustpan of glass into the garbage and looked over at Ben. "He's right, Ben. I know it's hard. Dean and I have both been in your shoes more times than we care to count, believe me, but he's right. Sleep is the best thing right now. In the morning, you can get on that website and Dean and I will call Amber's friends and see if any of them remember anything, okay?"

Ben let out another shuddering sigh. Dean walked over to Ben and held out his arm, offering to lend support on the side with the bad ankle and get him back to bed. As Ben put his arm across Dean's shoulders, Dean called back to Sam. "You're going to want to bring that broom to the bedroom and clean up a lamp."

* * *

**AN: I know that was a short little chapter, but I felt it best to end this one here than make the next one too long...Hope you are all enjoying the story. **


	11. Chapter 11

"Did you lace this with the dead man's blood?"

"Yes! Geez, how long have we been doing this, man?"

"Just making sure. Relax. It's just that it's my head K comes down on if the newbies wake up and go bat shit."

I could hear the two men talking and messing around down at the other cage. Not wanting to draw any undue attention my way, I lay still, pretending to sleep. I had no idea what they were talking about. What was dead man's blood? Some kind of drug maybe? It sounded as if they were using it to keep the other prisoner docile. Whatever it was, I wanted no part of it.

"Not sure if I like the idea. I mean look how screwy the new guy is."

"Hey man, I'm not going to question it. Are you?...Yeah, I didn't think so. Anyway, K says that shit'll wear off. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt."

"Only because he scares the shit out of you."

"You're no different."

"Heh, true. So this that cop's bitch?" I could tell they were right outside my cage now. It sounded like they were standing right over me and it was all I could do to remain still.

"Yeah. She won't last long."

"What? You don't think he'll change her?"

"You kidding?" I could hear one of them inhale deeply, as if relishing the scent of something. "Nah, he'll get one whiff of her and snack on her juicy ass. Come on, let's get out of here."

The sounds faded as the men left. I sat up and looked down at the other cage. There was a blood bag like you would see in a hospital hanging from a little hook on the chain link of the cage. My eyes fixated on it. For some reason I had trouble pulling my eyes away. For all the stories and movies and tv shows about vampires, the reality was just so fascinating, but, in a scary as shit sort of way.

My eyes followed the tubing that snaked down from the bag until they reached the girl at the other end. She had the end of the tube in her mouth and was sucking on it with fierce determination. She had sat part way up, one hand holding the tube, the other gripping the chain link until the knuckles went white. She was leaning into the fencing almost as if it took all her strength to even sit up that far. I wondered some more about this dead man's blood the two vamps were discussing. Is it what made the girl so lethargic?

"Hey.." I sort of whisper shouted, if that makes any sense. I wanted to talk to the girl but afraid to draw any attention if someone was keeping watch outside. "Hey!" I said again. The girl, at first, made no sign that she even knew I was there. Eventually, after several more attempts, the girl finally rolled her eyes in my direction. She blinked them very slowly and then just shut them, continuing to suck at the tube.

There were some sounds, then, at the door to the trailer and I quickly lay back down and did my I'm-just-sleeping thing. It's weird when, even with your eyes closed, you can _feel_ the presence of others in the room. The air around me just felt... pressed in? There continued to be sounds around me, shuffling feet, the clink of the padlock on my cage, the clearing of a throat. I could almost feel someone looming over me.

My heart began to race. This was it. I felt sure that these may be my last minutes on this Earth. I began to mentally say goodbye to friends and family. To co-workers, my 'girls', Sam and Dean, my father, whom I hardly ever saw anymore, and then Ben. ...Ben... What would I say to him, if I were able to have some last words? I'm sorry? I love you? Words escaped me. All I could see in my mind was a picture of him, lying on the couch, laughing. I almost cried but the opportunity was stolen from me when a pair of large hands wrapped around my upper arms and yanked me to my feet.

I opened my eyes and saw Goon One, the one who had originally grabbed me off the street. He reached forward and ripped the tape from my mouth. It felt so good to have that gone and I opened and closed my mouth a few times, stretching my lips.

"So, this is the detective's woman?" The voice was smooth and rich, with a slight accent that I couldn't quite place.

"Yes, Klaus, Greg confirmed it."

'Klaus' came around in front of me, looking at me. It was more like an examination and it felt uncomfortable. Klaus was tall. I would guess almost as tall as Ben's Uncle Sam. He looked a bit like a biker. Big, heavy black boots, black jeans, gleaming white t-shirt and a black leather vest. It wouldn't surprise me if there were a Harley parked outside. His hair was white and not the dry, dull white of old age. Dyed maybe? He wore it spiked and short.

I couldn't focus and facial features too much. The guy had mismatched eyes. One dark and one an ice blue. It was so odd and disconcerting, I found I couldn't look at them.

"What's your name?" He asked.

I didn't answer. Whether it was fear, blind stupidity, or that streak of stubbornness I get from my mother, I don't know. He reached out and grabbed the hair at the back of my head and yanked my head backward. Leaning in, he said quietly in my ear, "What. Is. Your. Name."

"Amber." I coughed out.

He released his hold on me and started to walk around me. "Your boyfriend is a cop...do you know who we are?"

"Yes." I practically whispered it, any strength to my voice long since gone.

He was behind me now and as he walked, he ran his fingers across my back, from shoulder to shoulder. I instinctively arched my back away from it. The guy seriously creeped me out. He continued to pace in circles around me. If I wasn't already nervous enough, his circling was making it worse. It felt like the hunter zeroing in on his prey.

He leaned into my ear again and whispered, "Do you know WHAT we are?" He drew back and watched for my reaction. My mouth had gone dry so I just nodded my head.

The circling started again. My feet seemed rooted to the spot. I don't care what current pop culture says or thinks about vampires. How they are supposed to exude sexuality. These guys were **not** sexy. They scared the shit out of me.

I turned my head, trying to follow him as he walked. I was afraid to move too much for fear of reprisal. Goon One hovered in the background in front of me. I'm sure Klaus didn't need an audience, which meant the Goon was probably here to keep me in line.

I realized Klaus had stopped behind me and it made my heart skip a beat. I didn't have to wonder what he was up to for long as I felt the chopsticks slide out and my hair fall down around my shoulders. Klaus chuckled quietly under his breath. He then grabbed my hair again, and pulled my head to the side, baring my neck to him. My breath was puffing so quickly and shallowly I thought I might hyperventilate.

"Do you know that I can _hear_ your heart racing like a rabbit?" His lips grazed my ear, he was so close. He then licked my neck. No, it wasn't a turn on. I cringed and thought I was going to be sick. "I can _smell_ your blood pumping through your veins." He sniffed me then, moving his nose up my neck and into my hair, as he did so.

Keeping his hold on my hair, he walked around in front of me again. He studied my face. "Now what to do with you..." He let go of my hair and started his pacing in circles again. I struggled to find my voice.

"I assume you are going to kill me? Make some sort of point?"

"Your boyfriend is getting too close to this, to us. I sent one of our lackeys to take care of him, but he had company and, well, let's just say the lackey wasn't quite ready for the task." Circle, circle, always circling.

"What's your aim here?" I nodded toward the other cage.

He paused in his circling and looked over to the other cage. "Hmm." He turned back to me and he studied my face again. It was like he was trying to see into my very soul and I had to look away from those eyes. "A little experiment is all."

Pacing, circling, brushing his fingers through my hair as he passes behind me. Goosebumps run down my arms and chills run up my spine.

"I think killing a cop would be, hmm, counter productive, no? But messing with his loved ones? Not so much. We need to send a message to him and you're it."

"Well, then, what's with the chit chat? Just kill me already." I look down at my feet. "Better you, than Dean." I say under my breath.

"Dean? Kill you? What's this?" He takes a hold of my chin and lifts my face to him. I don't like the action at all. It's too fatherly and, just **so** wrong in this situation. I jerk my chin away and answer him.

"Well I assume the message to be sent is my death. Or you make me like her." I once again nod to the other cage. "Either way, I think a death by you would be easier for me than the one Dean Winchester would dole out to me if I became one of you."

"Dean Winchester? Dean Winchester, as in Sam and Dean Winchester?"

"Yes." He was almost laughing. "What?"

"The Winchesters are a fairly tale! Super human hunters that can't die? Seriously? It's a story told to young vamps to keep them in line, nothing more."

It was my turn to laugh. He stopped his pacing and backhanded me across the face. I didn't see it coming and almost fell to the floor. I can't forget the level of whack job I'm dealing with, here. I hold my tape-club hands to my cheek and respond.

"They **are** real and you would be wise to believe me. Who do you think the guests were when your lackey showed up? You think you are the hunters, but you are, in fact, being hunted. They will not quit until every last one of you has lost their head."

He growled at me, then, and wrapped his hand around my throat, driving me back into the wall of the trailer. Shifting his hand up a bit, he pressed against my lower jaw, pushing my head up, so that I was looking right at him. "You have decided for me, my sweet." He turned his head and bit into his own wrist.

"No. No, no, no. Don't please." I continued to beg, for what it was worth.

He took his now bloodied wrist and started rubbing it all over my mouth. I held firm though, refusing to open it or lick at my lips. He growled again and clenched his jaw in frustration, making the tendons on his jaw dance. He then sucked at his own wrist and turned back to me with a wicked grin on his bloodied face. My stomach turned at the look in his eyes.

He moved his hand to the side of my face and planted his other hand on the other side. In any other situation, it could have been considered a lover's embrace. He pulled me to him and kissed me, forcing his tongue into my mouth. I could taste the coppery flavor of his blood swirling around in my mouth and tried to scream at him. It was a powerful and forceful kiss, almost painful. It was over before I knew it, but it would be forever burned into my memory.

He stepped back and laughed. "Bring on your Winchesters!"

I barely heard him. My mind was swimming with thoughts: disgust, horror, shock, fear, despair. They warred with each other and then the pain came. I gasped. Klaus put a hand to my chest, just below my neck and pushed me back against the wall again. Not hard, but enough to hold me there. A fierce burning pain spread like fire through my body. It took my breath away and screaming, yelling, even crying, were not an option. I felt myself begin to pass out. As much as I fought it, unconsciousness was slowly claiming me. I could feel Klaus's hand slowly lower me to the floor. Then there was darkness. Burning darkness.


	12. Chapter 12

Hope Dean and Sam don't mind cold showers, thought Ben. He had been standing in his shower for quite some time now. The warm water felt good on his shoulder and ankle, but it also hid the tears. He wants to be strong and emotionless, like his father, but it's so hard. He wasn't sure how Dean did it, to be honest. But, he was making progress. He was, at least, standing now. A minute ago he was kneeling in the bottom of the tub with no strength to hold himself up. He sobbed, he pounded his fists on the wall, and cried out to whatever god would hear him. What he wouldn't do to trade places with Amber, wherever she was.

Now, though, he had pulled himself together, somewhat, and had actually succeeded in washing his hair. _One step at a time, Braeden._ Next, the body, then towel off, then shave...ok, fuck shaving, not worth the effort. He finally made his way to the kitchen where Sam and Dean were already eating breakfast. He dropped into a chair, setting the crutches on the floor, and Sam set a plate of bacon and eggs in front of him. He nodded in thanks.

"Leave any water for the fishes?" Dean jokingly asked. Ben could read in his eyes that he was fully aware of what had occurred in the shower, but was being nice enough not to mention it.

"Mmm." Ben wasn't up for cheerful banter. He knew Dean was just trying to lighten the mood, but it just wasn't going to happen. Not yet, at any rate.

* * *

Amber came to some hours later. Most of the burning pain was gone, but now, her guts clenched with the worst cramps she had ever felt in her life. It felt like the mother of all charlie horses stretching from one side of her abdomen to the other. Her head was ringing and it seemed like she could hear every little sound; cars running down the road somewhere near, birds chirping, water sloshing the shore in the river as a boat goes by. She then realized her head wasn't really ringing, it was the faint electrical buzz of the light bulb over head that she was hearing. These must be the super senses that apparently vampires have.

She looked up at the bulb and it seared her eyes. She didn't remember it being quite so bright before. She turned her head back to the floor of her cage and her eye caught a glint of metal over in the corner. She crawled over to it, the best she could with her tape-club hands, to investigate. It was a jagged strip of metal sticking up, the floor having been gouged at some point in the life of this trailer.

She stared at the strip of metal for what seemed like an eternity. It was important for some reason, but she couldn't wrap her head around it. Her brain was so fuzzy, she was having trouble thinking clearly. She could only focus on two things: Ben and all the sensations her body was experiencing. She closed her eyes against the light for a moment and then back to the strip of metal. She could have sworn she heard an audible 'ding' when the thought occurred to her to use the strip of metal to cut away the tape on her hands. _Seriously, girl, you gotta get a grip!_

* * *

"You guys have any luck with any of Amber's friends?" Ben asked.

"No. None of them saw anything. Pretty much, when Robin crouched down to mess with her shoe, every last one of them looked down at her to see what she was doing." Sam said. He flopped down on the couch, disgusted.

"Yeah, that and they were so drunk, at that point, I don't think I'd believe anything they said even if they DID say they saw something." Dean said, from the armchair he always claimed when he was here. "How about you? Any luck with the DMV?"

"Actually, yes. There are only three of that make and model van currently registered in the surrounding area."

"Awesome." Dean said. "Give us the addresses and we'll head right out. See what we can see."

Dean and I shared another meaningful look like we had last night and he sighed.

"Damn it, Ben. You know you can't go -"

"Don't. Just...don't say it. I know." I sighed. I so desperately wanted to go but Dean was right. What use was I to them. I couldn't hope to contribute with this stupid ankle.

"Listen, it shouldn't take long to check out three places, right?" Sam said, trying to lighten the mood. "Sit tight and we'll be back before you know it."

"Hey, if you want, I can show you some websites tha-" Dean started.

"Dean! No, man, he doesn't need porn!" Sam face palmed and shook his head.

"What?" Dean looked truly confused by Sam's objection.

If Amber were here, she would've gotten such a kick out of it. Amber. God! I hated sitting around here when she was out there in trouble! Who knew if she was even still alive..._no, Ben. Do NOT go down that road._

"Just go, already, and bring me back news!" Ben said as he scribbled out addresses for them to follow up on.

Sam gathered up a few things and headed for the door while Dean took the piece of paper from me. "We'll find her, kid, we'll find her." He winked and turned to go.

I sat on the couch, staring off into nothing, listening to the rumble of the Impala as it drove away without me.

* * *

She was so close. It had taken her longer to tear through the tape than she thought it would, but she kept having to stop due to cramping in her guts. At times it was so painful she curled into a ball on the floor groaning. She wanted to scream, but for some reason, felt that silence was key to escaping this place. If they still thought she was out, then maybe they wouldn't bother her.

She had only a smidge of tape left to cut through and she pushed at the strip of metal, willing the tape to tear. The angle was horrible or she would already have ripped through. Being so close to the floor, she really couldn't get a good sawing motion going and had to just push at the metal instead. As she pushed on the final bit, it suddenly tore free and her hands shot forward and into the fencing at the bottom corner of her cage. Instead of jamming her hands into the links, the fence moved forward with the hit.

Frowning, she moved closer to the fencing while she pulled and yanked at the now torn tape on her hands. Balling and chucking the tape aside, she hesitantly reached forward to the corner of the fence. Pushing on it, she noticed that the metal ring, or whatever, that held the fencing down to the floor in the corner was broken. She grabbed tightly to it and pulled it into the cage as hard and as far as she could, taking note of how much of a gap it made and where the next attachment rings were located.

She kept working the fencing into the cage, then out, and back and forth, slowly pulling and bending the fencing near the next attachment rings. Eventually she thought she might have enough room to squeeze through, but it was going to be tight. Well, no pain, no gain, right? She lay down and pushed against the fence, slowly inching her way through. It WAS tight and at one point she thought she may have gotten herself stuck. She gave a mighty push with her legs and got through it, with a sudden searing pain in her thigh.

When she finally got all the way out, she looked down to find the strip of metal she had used to get her tape off had cut open her thigh. The smell of the blood, even though it was her own, was intoxicating. She swiped her fingers through it and held them up, gazing at them. _No! Don't you dare, Amber Corinne!_ Amber quickly wiped her fingers on her clothes and headed for the door to the trailer.

* * *

Dean and Sam pulled up outside the first address. It was a bakery and a pretty busy one, at that. They could see the van parked along the side of the building. Before going in, they walked over to the van and looked it over. Nothing about it screamed kidnapping and, quite honestly, they didn't really know what they were looking for.

The shop, itself, was packed with people. Granted it was a small shop, but there were a lot of people in there. People were ordering wedding cakes and birthdays cakes, purchasing breakfast pastries, buying cookies. You name it, business was hopping for this place.

Sam and Dean made their way to the back of the crowd and held up their FBI badges above everyone's heads. A minute later, one of the employees looked up and saw them at the back. They motioned them to the rear of the store and held up a finger for them to wait, while they went into the back of the building.

A minute later, they returned with a woman who looked to be roughly in her fifties.

"Hello, gentlemen. Mario tells me you are FBI?"

"Yes ma'am. Special Agents Murphy and Dresden." Sam said as they held out their badges again.

"Please come back to my office where we can speak privately." She led the way back into a back room which opened up into a large kitchen. Immediately to the right was a small office. "Please come in. Can I get you a coffee or anything?"

"Ah, no. No thank you." Sam answered.

"Name's Danielle Fusillo. What can I do for you? I'm not in any kind of trouble am I? Or one of my employees?" People always got nervous when they had badges flashed in their faces.

"No, not at all. Well, we certainly hope not. We'd like to ask you about the van you have parked outside." Dean said.

"Yes, who has permission to be driving it?" Sam inquired.

"Well, anyone. Whoever is free to make a delivery, goes."

"Has there been any unauthorized use?" Dean asked, picking up a cookie from a small plate she held out to him and popping it into his mouth.

"Unauthorized? Well, no! Not that I'm aware of. What is all this about the van?"

"We aren't at liberty to discuss an ongoing investigation, Miss Fusillo. Is it always parked right outside the building?"

"Oh no! I get paranoid about some young hooligans painting and marking it up with their graffiti. I use it as a company vehicle and I drive it home each night."

"So, the van was in your possession around 1 – 3 am this morning?" Sam asked.

"Well, I get to work at 3am. I'm pretty sure no one was out joyriding in it before I left the house."

"Thank you for your time, Miss Fusillo." Dean said and turned to leave.

In the car, Sam said "Well, that was a bust."

"Good cookies though! I might have to go back for more info." Dean said with a grin.

The second address was a bust, too. When Sam saw the van he knew it wasn't right. It had blue and green stripes added to it, diagonally down the sides. Sam insisted the van he saw was plain white. So, on to the last address. This had to be it.

It turned out to be a small auto parts supply store and Dean was in heaven. As they walked in, Dean looked like a bobblehead trying to take everything in. He nudged Sammy with his elbow. "Hey, how about some custom rims for my Baby?" He had a big shit-eating grin on his face.

"Let's try to focus on why we're here, okay?"

"Can I help you gentlemen?" asked the employee who appeared out of the tire racks at the back. He eyed them and got a look on his face of confusion. He probably didn't have guys in suits in here too often. His eyes traveled over the brothers and then slid out the window at front and they grew to twice their size. "Is that your ride?" he asked in awe.

"Sure is!" Dean said, beaming with pride.

"'68 Impala? No, no...'67."

"Yessir."

Sam cleared his throat and pulled out his badge and Dean, seeing it, followed suit. "Morning. Special Agents Murphy and Dresden. We'd like to ask you a few questions. Are you the owner?"

The guy distractedly pulled his eyes away from the Impala outside to glance over at them. His eyebrows went up in surprise, as if seeing them for the first time. "Um, yeah, I'm the owner. Rest of the guys won't be in for another half hour or so. Name's Silas. Friends call me Si." He reached out and shook hands with them.

Sam continued, "We'd like to ask you about your Ford Connect van."

"Oh! Has it been recovered?"

Dean and Sam exchanged a glance. "Recovered?"

"I'm sorry. I thought that's what this was about. I reported it stolen, oh, a month or more ago."

"Stolen, you say? A month ago?"Dean repeated.

"There abouts, yeah. They even had a report of it being seen last week, but when the cops got out there, there was nothing to be found."

Sam pulled out his pad and pen. "Where was that sighting?"

"Over in the old industrial park, off of Hearst Street. Only one, maybe two, businesses in there anymore."

"We'll check it out. Thanks for your help, Silas." Sam shook his hand and headed for the door.

Dean shook his hand as well and started after Sam.

"You ever need anything for that Impala, you let me know." Silas called after them.

"You got it, Si." Dean said. "Hey Sam." Dean called after his brother. Sam turned and saw Dean holding up a set of those chrome silhouettes of naked women and raising his eyebrows. "Huh, huh?"

"Dean, you don't even have mudflaps." Sam gave him a classic bitch face and walked out to the car.

"Yeah, whatever..." Dean grumped.

Once in the car, Dean gave Ben a call. "Ben, we've checked out all three addresses and I think we may be onto something.."

"_Yeah?_"

"Last address. The owner said his van was stolen about a month ago and was spotted just last week over in some old industrial park off of Hearst. Sam and I are going to cruise on over there and troll the grounds, see what there is to see."

When they got to the industrial park, it was basically a road that led through a Castle Storage depot and out into a warehousing area. Most of them looked empty and some looked to be falling apart. Dean just slowly rolled through and he and Sam kept their eyes peeled for anything suspicious.

They'd been through the whole place, and were on their way out, when Sam suddenly called for Dean to stop.

"Does that look like a person down there?" Sam pointed to the shade at the side of one of the buildings down a side road. Dean leaned over and squinted. He popped the car into reverse, backed up a bit, and turned down the road.

"Probably a homeless guy." Dean said as he rolled the car slowly down the road, not wanting to spook whomever it was.

"Oh my God, Dean." Sam almost whispered as they pulled up. "Is that...?"

As Dean stopped the car and got out, he looked over the hood of the car. The person, girl, was huddled into the shade, rocking back and forth, and covering her face. She was chanting something over and over to herself: "...make it stop...make it stop...make it stop..."

Sam got out on his side and they looked at each other over the car. Dean pulled out his blade, as did Sam, and they nodded to each other. Dean slowly made his way around the front of the car and approached the girl, stopping about 5 feet from her. "Amber?"

Amber lifted her hands from her face, squinting into the light at them.


	13. Chapter 13

"No! Back up! Stay away!" Amber called out, covering her mouth and nose with her hand. She was kneeling in the dirt at the side of the building. Almost cowering in the shade that it provided.

Dean set his blade on the hood of the car and put his hands up in a non-threatening manner. Sam frowned at him, but he just tipped his head to the side, expecting Sammy to have his back. Sam adjusted his grip on his own blade and nodded back.

Dean slowly rounded the front of the car. "Amber. Are you okay?"

"No! Stay-oh God!" She gripped her mid section and folded herself down over her knees. "I can smell you...I can...I can hear your hearts beating. Please, for the love of God, stay back." She looked up at them, then, and her mouth was full of teeth. They had turned her.

"Amber? Have you not fed yet?" Sam gently asked.

"God, no! How can I? That's...that's just...God no..."

Sam raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Dean."

"I know. A vamp with a conscience. Weird, huh?"

Sam gave Dean his bitch face and rolled his eyes. "I meant, we can still save her, Dean."

"That too. Amber, do you know who turned you? Would you be able to identify the bastard if you saw them again?" Dean asked as quietly as he could. He had been in her shoes and knew how god-awful loud the world was when you suddenly had super hearing.

"Oh yes. I would know that freak anywhere." She doubled over again, gripping her stomach.

"Amber, we're going to get you back to the house, okay?" Dean still slowly approached her, hands still held out in front of him.

"No! No! I'm not safe. I don't know how long I'll be able to hold out. I'm **so** hungry, you have no idea."

"Oh, honey, I do know. Feels like something is trying to gnaw it's way out of your gut from the inside? Like your veins are buzzing with electricity, tingling? Your head feels like it's going to burst with all the constant noise. Your eyes burn from the intensity of the light."

Amber looked at him in awe. "You really know your monsters, Mr. Winchester." She said through gritted teeth.

"Well, it takes one to know one. Listen, you'll be safer at the house, where we can keep an eye on you, than out on the streets. You lose it out here and someone dies, then you'll be next on our to do list."

Amber shot him a look. She assumed she was already on their hit list. She was turned into a vampire, after all.

"Amber," Sam said, "You're not 100% gone yet. As long as you don't feed and we can take out the one who changed you, there's still hope."

"I don't understand..."

"We have a little concoction we can make. Smells like ass, tastes like ass, knocks you on your ass, but it works. I'm living proof. But we need to get you off the streets where we can make sure you don't feed while we go after the monsters who did this to you." Dean answered. By now he was mere feet from her. He held out his hand to her. Sam took a couple steps closer. He thought Dean was taking an unnecessary risk.

As he held his hand out to her, Amber hissed and suddenly lunged for him. He was ready for her, though, and grabbing her shoulder, spun her around so that her back fell into his chest. He pulled out a syringe from his pocket and jabbed it into her neck. She slowly went limp in his arms and he scooped her up.

"Damn it, Dean. That was stupid."

"Yeah, yeah, open your door, would ya?"

"You're putting her in the front seat? What's up?"

"Yeah, get the cuffs from the back."

Sam came back around, after a second, holding cuffs out to Dean who then cuffed Amber to the door handle. "Now she can't vamp out on us in here."

"What's up Dean?"

"She'll be able to take us right to them." When Sam looked at him in confusion he continued. "Remember when I was vamped out? I had an internal compass, almost, led me right to them. She should be able to do the same."

Amber came around a couple minutes later. She was groggy, but aware of her surroundings. She jerked her hands in the cuffs and looked down at the door. "Oh God, you two smell like a Biggerson's Buffet. Crack a window or something."

Dean glanced at Sam, sitting in the back behind Amber, and they both rolled down their respective windows.

"Not good enough." she eventually said.

Dean looked at Sam and sighed. "Hold her head."

Sam reached forward from the back and wrapped his hands across Amber's forehead. His large hands made her look all the more tiny. Sam pulled her head back a bit, giving himself the leverage. Dean slowly reached across her and rolled her window down, hearing her hiss in his ear as he did so. "Better?"

"Guess it's as good as it's gonna get." she answered, scrunching up her face in a look of disgust.

"Amber, we're going to get you back, safe, to the house, but we need you to lead us to the vampire's nest first." Dean looked closely at her. She squinted her eyes at the sun and slowly rocked back and forth in the seat. He knew she was fighting her hunger. He only hoped she'd hold out long enough to do this.

"Yeah. Okay. I can do that. They are really close." She said all of it without opening her eyes. She looked to be retracing her steps in her head and then said, "Go to the right, past this building. Go back past two more buildings and make a left. Follow that track back and around and eventually you'll see on the left a lot with an old one story office building and a bunch of old shipping containers. That's where they are."

As soon as she started giving directions, Dean started up the car and headed out, following the steps she was giving. He slowly pulled up outside the lot that Amber spoke of. To the left was a small, squat building with it's windows boarded up. In a horseshoe shape back around from it, were about ten to fifteen old shipping containers. The big heavy duty metal things that they transported stuff in on those huge tanker ships. Most were surrounded by weeds and rusting. There were two, off to the right, that had wiring going from them to a generator that sat chugging away between them.

"I'm going to hazard a guess that you came from one of those two containers there?" Dean said, pointing to the two wired boxes.

Amber opened her eyes a crack and took a peek. "Yup. Can we go now?"

Dean looked back at Sam, who nodded his head. "Okay, let's get you out of here."

After they made their way through the industrial park and just before Dean headed out onto the main road, he pulled over. He pulled out another syringe of dead man's blood. "Sorry Amber, but I think this trip would go much better for you if you were unconscious."

Amber merely nodded and lowered her head. He looked at Sam, who reached out and took hold of her head again. He jabbed a small amount of the dead man's blood into her neck and watched as she slowly dropped off, grimacing as she did so.

"Open the trunk, would ya?" He said to his brother.

Sam reached across the front seat, retrieving the keys. Going around back, he popped the trunk and arranged some blankets to make a more comfortable ride for Amber. Dean removed the handcuffs from the door handle, went around to the passenger door and scooped her up.

"You sure about the trunk? What if she wakes up and freaks out in here?" Sam asked.

"Would you want her waking up and freaking out in the car?" Dean asked.

Dean gently lay her down onto the pile of blankets, taking a moment to pull a strand of hair out of her face. Sam was surprised. He rarely saw that side of Dean. He obviously had become attached to Amber. Sam got the feeling that if Ben ever broke it off with her, Dean would still come to visit her. Dean gently closed the trunk over Amber's still form, acting as if he had done nothing even remotely touching.

"You have a point." Sam smiled to himself. He knew better than to bring up the fact that Dean was having a chick flick moment.

"Anyway, it's nice and dark in the trunk." Dean said as he slid in behind the wheel. "You coming, Bitch?"

Sam shook his head, smiling. He folded his tall frame into the car looking at his brother. Dean knew he had seen his moment with Amber. "Yeah, Jerk, let's go."

* * *

When they arrived back at Ben's place, Dean left the car running out on the road with Sam and ran in to talk to Ben. A moment later the garage door went up and Dean was backing Amber's car out, pulling it off the side of the driveway. He jogged back to the Impala and pulled it into the garage, putting the door down behind. Ben stood at the door to the house, waiting anxiously.

"Now listen, Ben. I said we found Amber, but she's not herself." Dean said, as he got out of the car.

"What do you mean by that? Where is she? What did those fuckers do to her?" Ben was craning his neck, trying to see into the car and growing more and more agitated.

Dean walked over to Ben, grabbing him by his upper arms, gaining his attention. "Ben! Calm down, damn it! She'll be okay, with our help. She was turned, Ben."

"What? She was...what?" Ben looked confused. He glanced over at Sam and then back to Dean who looked down at the floor. When Dean looked back up, he could see a look of dawning horror appear on Ben's face. "They...turned her. If they turned her, how can you say she'll be okay? How could she possibly be okay?!"

Ben's voice was rising again. "Listen, kid, I know you're freaking right now. But there **is** a cure if you catch the victim at the right point, which we have. Okay? Calm down. Seriously. We can't have her come to and hear your heart racing a mile a minute."

Ben nodded his head, reigned in his emotions, took a deep breath, and slowly let it out. "Okay. Okay. Sorry. I'm calm, I swear." Another breath puffed out and he nodded his head again.

"Okay, then, get a chair and some rope or duct tape or something and open the door to the basement. We're going to set her up down there for now." Dean headed over to the trunk.

"You put her in the trunk?!"

"Ben! Calm! Now!" Dean turned and gave him a look that made him shut his mouth so fast, Dean heard his teeth clack together. Dean again bent to the task of opening the trunk, giving Ben one more warning look before raising the lid.

Amber hadn't moved at all. Dean leaned down and scooped her up. When he stood, Ben was gone. _Good. Going to have to keep the boy busy or he'll go nuts over this._ Dean knew full well how hard it was to detach from any given situation when loved ones were involved.

Dean carried her into the house and down the stairs to the basement. Sam had gone ahead and had the chair and some duct tape ready to go. Dean set her down on it and he and Sam worked at getting her restrained. Dean set her hands on her lap and Sam ran the tape around her upper body, arms, and chair several times. Dean then looked around the room.

He hadn't been down here before. There was a pool table and dart board to his right and a small bar with two stools to his left. Sam had set up the chair at the wall in front of him. Back behind him were the stairs and, behind them, was a laundry area. Luckily, this wasn't one of those homes that had little windows in the basement. He could never quite understand windows in basements, anyway. Most people used them for storage, so why have windows in a room one hardly ever sees? Needless to say, he was fairly pleased with the set up. It was dark, or would be when they turned off the lights, and there was only the one way in or out.

He could hear Ben making his way slowly down the stairs. As he rounded the bottom of the steps, he saw Amber and stopped short. "Why the hell is she taped in a chair?!"

Dean and Sam looked at each other. Sam hesitantly replied, "Amber already tried to attack Dean, Ben. We can't let her feed and we don't want to risk you being her first meal."

"Yeah, Ben, we need to keep her restrained. She's fine now, but if she wakes up..." Dean's voice trailed off.

Ben just stood there staring hard at Amber, then hobbled over to her, took a hold of her head, tipped it up and kissed her forehead.

"Okay. What do you need me to do?" Ben said, having regained control over his emotions.


	14. Chapter 14

I wanted to help any way I could but I knew I couldn't leave Amber. No, _wouldn't_ leave Amber. If my father said he could save her, then I believed him. I also knew Amber well enough to know she wouldn't want to continue on as a vampire. If, for whatever reason, she needed to be stopped or they couldn't save her, then I felt I should be the one to do so.

"What can you do?" Sam said, repeating my question back to me. "Well, do you have those descriptions of the vamps handy?"

"Well, I can access them on the computer upstairs." I started to turn back toward the stairs.

"No, wait." Sam pulled off the pack he had flung over his shoulder and removed his laptop from it. He set it on the bar, opened it up and flipped it around to face me. "Can you use this?"

"Yeah." I limped over to the bar and started accessing the station's files.

"Notice you aren't using your crutches." Dean said.

"Yeah, well, I can't baby it forever." I said, somewhat distractedly. Dean nodded his head in what I took as approval. "Here you go." I spun the laptop back around to face Sam.

Dean and Sam leaned over the laptop, reading. "So," Dean said, "two frat boys and Hanz and Franz."

I looked at my father with total confusion. "Hanz and...who?"

Sam shook his head and rolled his eyes. "Never mind, Ben. So, these four guys, possibly one or two more at the nest, and the leader."

"No problem." Dean said, confidently with a grin. I swore my father might actually get off on the kill.

"Klaus." Came a quiet voice. The three men turned around toward Amber. She was coming to and rolling her head around. "His name is Klaus."

"Cut the lights, Ben." Dean said quietly. As I turned the lights off, Dean flicked on a small flashlight, aiming it toward the floor. "You've met him, then. The leader?"

"Heh, you could say that. Guy gets a little fresh with the ladies, if you ask me." Amber said disgustedly. She groaned, a little, under her breath.

"So he's the one who turned you. What did he look like?" Sam asked.

"He's big, guys. Tall like Uncle Sam, but built like Papa Dean." Dean grinned, looked down at the circle of light on the floor and shook his head. Amber liked to call him Papa Dean. I found it amusing and Dean usually cringed whenever she said it. It was nice to know the real Amber was still in there, somewhere. "You can't miss him. Dyed white, spikey hair and mismatched eyes."

"Mismatched eyes? Like different colors?" Sam asked.

"Yeah. One ice blue, the other dark. Brown, maybe? Guy dresses like a biker. At least he was last I saw him. He's foreign too. German I'd guess, not that it matters, but I can still hear his voice in my head." Amber grimaced and groaned again.

Dean crouched down in front of her. "I know you're hungry, Amber, but try to stay with us. And pay attention to that voice in your head. It's not memory you're hearing."

"What?"

"Yeah, what?" I asked.

"Every vampire not only has a connection with their sire, but to the alpha vamp, as well. I'm guessing, since you haven't passed out, that what you're hearing is your sire, Klaus." Dean explained.

"Wait, passed out? She would pass out if the alpha was, what? Talking to her?" I asked, before Amber could.

"It's hard to explain. When I was vamped out, the Alpha sent some sort of telepathic message to all of us at once. We all passed out." Dean looked again at Amber. "What's the little voice in your head telling you?" He asked with a grin. With the light coming up from the floor, Dean's grin looked almost sinister.

"Very funny, Papa." Amber sat quietly for a minute and we all waited as she 'listened'. "Nothing. Not really. I'm not getting actual words so much as a sense or feeling. It's like I'm feeling reassured. A sense of calm paired with...searching?"

"Hmm. He knows you're missing and wants you to relax. They will be coming for you." Dean, Sam, and I exchanged worried glances in the half light. "We need to get going and hit them in the day before they get to looking for her."

"What do we need?" I asked.

"**We** need our machetes. **You** need to stay here."

"How did I know you'd say that?"

Sam put his hand on my good shoulder. "Ben, we need you to keep an eye on Amber. Getting the blood of her sire and mixing up the antidote will be useless if she escapes and snacks on the neighbors." He paused and then said, "Or you."

Amber groaned again and did some quick breathing, trying to manage the hunger, I imagined.

I sighed. I knew that was coming and even agreed with it. Didn't make it any harder to swallow. "So babysit the queen, here, and make sure she doesn't snack on anyone. Piece of cake."

"Watch it, buddy." Amber said. I could hear the duct tape, wrapped around her, creak with her movements.

"Okay. Take it easy, you two. ANY hunger isprobably not a good thing, right now. You need to keep her quiet and dosed with dead man's blood."

"Dead man's blood? I heard some of the goons discussing it. They were lacing the blood they were feeding the other caged vamp, with it. What is it?"

Dean and Sam exchanged concerned looks. "They were purposely giving dead man's blood to one of their own?" Sam asked, incredulously.

"Yes. They said something about Klaus saying it would keep them under control until they were done or ready or something. Is it some sort of mind control drug? Or sedative?" Amber said through clenched teeth.

"Sedative. Dead man's blood isn't a drug. It really _is_ dead man's blood. Acts like a tranquilizer to vamps. Juice them with enough of it and it's like a poison, causing pain and subduing them to the point where they can't fight back. Makes beheading them easier." Sam explained.

"Wait! You've been giving this shit to Amber?" I couldn't believe it.

"Calm down. I said in high doses. We've only given Amber a small touch of it to knock her out and keep her calm. If she vamps out, Ben, she could rip right through the tape and take you down in a heartbeat."

"It's ok, Franken Ben. I'm not in any extra pain. I really feel like having a nightcap and taking a nap."

"Not funny, Amber." I said.

"Wasn't trying to be funny." My stomach lurched. "Seriously, guys, you all smell _really_ good. And Ben's heart rate just kicked up a notch. Mmmm"

"Uh, yeah. Speaking of which, sounds like she could use some more." Dean said. "Sammy why don't you show him how to do that and I'll get our gear together." Dean handed the flashlight to Sam, who nodded, and headed for the stairs.

"Ben." Sam motioned me over to the bar. He reached into his pack again and pulled out a thick glass jar. It was sealed shut with one of those hinged vacuum lids. He reached in again and pulled out a couple syringes. Two were filled all the way and the third was empty. Motioning to the full ones, Sam said, "These are for if you get company while we're out. Jab the vamp anywhere and pump them full. These are enough to take down anything."

He picked up the third syringe, which was much smaller in size than the first two. "This one is for Amber. You only need a millimeter. It doesn't take much to calm her down, okay?" He flipped the lid up and off the jar and dipped the syringe down into the blood. He drew back the stopper slowly, until it reached the 1ml line, and then handed it to me. "Considering the way we have her trussed up, the neck is probably the safest spot to hit her. You can go in from behind and stay away from her mouth that way."

Sam looked at me, waiting. I swallowed hard and slowly walked over to Amber.

"What are you waiting for, big guy?" she asked.

"I'm sorry, Amber."

"I understand why it needs to be done. Just do it, already."

I reached out with my good arm and put my hand above her right ear, tilting and holding her head to the side. With my right, I quickly jabbed the short needle into her neck, plunging it's contents in. It didn't hurt my shoulder too much to do it. Hopefully that meant it was getting better sooner than I thought it would.

She shook her head. "Wow, that stuff is pretty fast act..." Her head dropped to her chest.

"Based on when we last dosed her," Sam ventured, "I'd say give her some about once every hour. Keep it dark in here, and...probably you should stay out of the basement. I'm thinking we all smell pretty good to her and we don't want to make it any harder for her than we need to."

I nodded my head and went back over to the bar. I refilled the syringe so that it would be ready for the next time I needed it. I eyed the two large syringes with their deadly doses. I picked them up and slid them into my back pocket, hoping I wouldn't later be using one on Amber.

The thought of what Amber had been through, already, made my blood boil. I hated that I was injured and unable to join in the hunt. How I wouldn't love to get my hands on this Klaus! Dean called to us from upstairs, then, and we headed up.

"Here's a machete for you to keep handy." Dean said as I came through the door at the top of the stairs. He was holding out a sinister looking blade. "I doubt you'll need it, but ya never know."

I took the knife, feeling it's heft and balance. I've never done a lot of knife fighting of any kind. Here's hoping it's a quiet day.

"Get some good momentum going and just lop off their heads." He said with a smirk. I noticed Sam strapping on a leg sheath for his blade. Dean was already wearing his and was once again absently rubbing at his inner arm. I wonder if I'll ever get the story behind that.

"Remember, about one mL of dead man's blood every hour." Sam said. "And try to stay out of the basement."

"Got it. You two be careful."

"Don't worry about us, we'll be fine." Dean said as he headed for the garage and his car. It was about 2pm and they had plenty of daylight in which to accomplish their task.

I looked down at my watch and set the timer on it to go off every hour as they backed out of the garage. I listened to the rumble of the Impala as it drove away and settled onto the couch for the nerve wracking wait.


	15. Chapter 15

Sam eyed Dean for a moment as they drove. "What's with the shotgun on a string?"

Dean had tied a long cord to the handle of his shotgun and looped it over his head and one arm. "It's so I won't lose it when I have to lop off a few heads, duh." Dean smirked at him.

"Dean, I meant, why even have the shotgun at all? You know full well they are useless against vampires."

"Ahh, but this is a special shotgun."

"Yeah, right. It's the same sawed off you've been using for years."

"Okay, then, the ammo is special. Brewed it up myself. Gotta occupy myself somehow when your lazy ass is sleeping at night." Sam gave him his classic bitch face to which Dean smiled all the harder.

"So, are you going to tell me about your special ammo, or sit there grinning like a fool?"

"Just enjoying the moment, Sammy." Dean chuckled and Sam sighed. "Okay, okay... I've been thinking that we need a way to slow a vamp down without putting our necks out there, if ya know what I mean. A ranged weapon, if you will."

"True. That would be handy, but I don't see how rock salt rounds will do anything other than piss them off even more."

"Who said anything about rock salt?" Dean grinned again and Sam arched an eyebrow. "When we first heard about the possible vampire situation out here, I made a stop at a gun shop and picked up some regular buckshot."

"Buckshot. Might slow one down for a split second. Don't see how that helps."

"True, but, when all that loose buckshot has been dipped in and coated with dead man's blood..." Dean raised his eyebrows at his brother, waiting for the ding of the the lightbulb.

Sam thought it through, tipped his head toward Dean and said, "That just might work..."

"Ding!" Sam frowned at him, not really sure what the 'ding' was about. "Might not stop them dead, but I'm thinking it'll slow 'em down a bit." Dean said with a self satisfied grin plastered on his face.

"And the string?" Sam asked.

"Well, I gotta have my hands free to lop some heads off, like I said. Don't wanna have to set it down and then pick it up each time."

"Alright, MacGyver, we'll see." Sam said, grinning himself this time.

"Hey, MacGyver was badass, so I'll take that as a compliment." Sam just shook his head.

They came up to the nest location and Dean drove slowly by. They didn't see any activity and they hoped they were all sleeping. They agreed to park someplace beyond the nest and then double back on foot.

Dean parked on the far side of an old shed, they gathered their gear , and headed back through a weedy lot. Crouching just inside the weeds, they scoped out what they could see. Nothing moved. Dean nodded to Sam and then crept up to the rear of the first container. He crouched down and kept an eye on the boarded up office across the way. Sam went off to the side. He was to circle the entire grounds and then come back to report.

Just when Dean was getting antsy enough to go in on his own, Sam returned. Whispering, he reported, "Not a soul. Office has only one other door at the back, but it's so overgrown with weeds, I'd say it hasn't been used in a long time."

"Okay, so only one way in or out." Dean whispered back.

"The two containers here with the generator are padlocked shut, so no worries there."

"Yeah, we'll save them for last. You ready bro?" Sam just nodded his head and waited. On any hunt, when it came time for the actual take down, Sam always deferred to Dean. It's how they've always worked best together. Dean stood up, taking point, and Sam followed him in.

They made their way quickly across the dusty open space, to the front of the office, putting their backs to the wall on either side of the door. Taking another look around them, Dean then eyed his brother. Sam nodded, holding his machete at the ready. Dean reached out and slowly twisted the door nob, easing the door open a crack. He leaned back again against the wall waiting. When nothing happened, he poked his head in to get a layout of what they were dealing with.

The office building had been divided into several rooms at one point, but the walls had been knocked down and it was one large room now, maybe sixty by fifty feet. Arranged rather haphazardly around the room were cots, mattresses and sleeping bags. From what Dean could make out, there were about five bodies in there. He ducked his head back out and held up his hand to Sammy with all fingers out, mouthing the number five to him. That was all of them the four goons plus the leader. Sam signaled the number six back at Dean. He was right, there was the whack job vamp that showed up at Ben's place. There should be six. They would have to worry about that later.

Dean didn't like the idea of going into a large open room full of vamps with nothing to put at his back. He switched spots with Sam and whispered for him to play along. Dean suddenly yelled out, "This is the police! Come out of the building single file with your hands out in front of you!" Sam looked shocked at his brother, there went the element of surprise.

The door then opened slowly and Sam quickly backed away, motioning for the man to come out. When the guy had cleared the door, Dean kicked it shut. The guy quickly spun in Dean's direction and Sam took his head off. One down. Dean grinned at Sammy who just shook his head. He thought Dean got far too much enjoyment out of this sort of thing. The door started to open again and when the guy saw his buddy one the ground minus his head, he started to back peddle into the guy behind him. Sam reached forward and quickly grabbed the guy by the arm, yanking him out through the door. Dean again kicked the door shut, swung his machete, and made it two down.

The door never opened again and the time had come to go in. Dean and Sam looked down at the two they had gotten already and recognized them as the two frat boys. They looked at each other, again, checking for readiness. Sam nodded and Dean whipped the door open. When nothing came flying out at them, they went in. Dean went to the right, shotgun ready, and Sam went left. The way was clear for Sam, but not so much for Dean.

The whack job vampire, that had visited Ben's place, was coming at Dean. He raised the gun up and let off a shot. The blast echoed throughout the building. Sam quickly scanned the room and saw Dean's Hanz and Franz at the back, getting out of their beds. Looking back at the vamp Dean had just shot, Sam saw him stagger back a few steps and then drop to his knees. He clutched a hand to his chest and then pulled it away, looking at it. He looked at his bloody hand for a moment and then up at Dean. A look of confusion crossed his face. It would be the last thought he had, as Dean made quick work of him. When Dean looked up at Sam, his face was splattered with blood and he was grinning from ear to ear. It was a rather disturbing scene.

After the shotgun incident, the one goon, as Amber called them, hung back, wary. The other came at them unafraid. He was making his way toward Sam and Dean shot him. He stumbled to the floor and Dean took the opportunity to reload. Apparently, it wasn't enough buckshot for a vamp of his size, because he got right back up and kept coming. Dean shot him again, catching him in the shoulder and the side of his head, turning it to a bloody mess. He went down again and Sam moved in the for the kill.

While they had been dealing with goon one, the other had taken advantage of the distraction to make his way along the wall and was coming up behind Dean. Sam looked up from the work of beheading a goon with little neck to work with and called out, "Dean!" Dean turned and the vampire grabbed him by his jacket and tossed him behind him and into the wall. It was a jarring force and Dean dropped the machete. The goon was on him in a flash.

He grabbed the shotgun by the hot barrel and yanked it. The string, attached to it, lifted Dean off the floor. He grabbed a fistful of Dean's shirt with one hand, pinning him to the wall, and continued to pull on the shotgun until the string broke. He chucked the gun behind him and brought his fist forward into Dean's face. Once. Twice. A third time. Dean struggled in vain to fight him off. He was being held to the wall, toes dangling just above the floor. His lip had split and his nose felt like it was broken. The vampire leaned in and licked the blood from Dean's face and laughed.

The goon seemed to have forgotten Sam. Sam quietly made his way to the discarded shotgun. Taking aim, he shot the vampire across his back. He merely turned and glared at Sam. "You're next, little man." He said.

Dean actually laughed. "Well, I have never heard anyone call my brother little before. That's a first." The goon turned back to Dean and grabbed his head by the hair, yanked it to the side. He leaned in and bit Dean. "Agh! Sammy! Shoot him again!"

Sam shrugged his shoulders. He didn't have ammo for the shotgun. Dean had it all. "Son of a Bitch, Sammy!"

The vampire raised his head and sighed like a man dying of thirst having had a cold glass of water. He bent down and wiped his bloody mouth on Dean's shoulder. Just then the side of his neck sprouted the end of a machete. He tossed Dean to the side and turned on Sam. He turned so quickly that the machete jerked free from Sam's hands and remained lodged in the side of the goon's neck. As he came toward Sam, Sam tossed the shotgun in Dean's direction.

Leaning against the wall, one hand applying pressure to the side of his neck, Dean struggled to reload the gun one handed. He looked up to see how his brother was faring and didn't see him. Looking around, he spotted him in a tangled heap with one of the cots across the room with the goon in bound. The goon bent down, grabbed Sam by the jacket and tossed him back in Dean's direction. Just as Sammy cleared the area, Dean let off another shot, hitting the vamp square in the chest. He stopped, wiped at the bloody front of his shirt with his hand, and then redirected himself toward Dean again.

"Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Shit." Dean was having trouble with the gun. He had lost too much blood from his neck and was beginning to see stars. The gun felt like it weighed fifty pounds. "Sammy..." He said weakly, looking for his brother. As Sam's head came up, about ten feet away, Dean tried to toss the gun in his direction. It fell horribly short. Then the vamp was on him.

Lifting him up against the wall, again, he leaned in for another drink. At least, that's what Dean thought he was doing. Instead, the vamp smeared his bloody hand all over Dean's face. All Dean could think was '_aww, shit, not again...'_.

"You've severely diminished our ranks, human, we find ourselves in sudden need of recruits."

"Duck Dean!" Sam suddenly called out. That was easy, thought Dean, and he just dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes right as the gun roared. He felt a few of the buckshot rounds hit him in the upper arm and shoulder as he went. They burned, or maybe that was the vampire blood, making it's way through his system. One bonus to getting vamped again, is the wound to his neck was already starting to heal.

The goon went down, that time. Unfortunately, he went down on top of Dean. Sam worked his way over and, before the goon could get himself untangled from Dean, Sam finished the job he had started with his machete. Blood gushed from the stump where his head had been all down over Dean's head. He looked up at his brother, face red with blood. "Really, Sammy?" Sam held his hand out and helped Dean out from under the vampire.

"How are you doing?" Sam asked, concerned.

"Well, good news...I'm no longer bleeding out from my neck. Bad news, you're looking and smelling awfully tastey, bro."

Sam looked a bit worried and took a step back. "Already?"

Dean chuckled. "No, little brother, but if we dilly dally too much longer, you're gonna start to."

Sam pulled a stoppered vial from his inside pocket and collected some blood from the goon at their feet. He held it up for Dean to see and said, "An essential ingredient to Dean's special Ass Stew."

"Fucking hilarious." Dean groaned. "Let's get a move on."

They did a sweep of the building and found nothing. They then headed over to the trailers. Dean pulled a pair of bolt cutters from Sammy's bag and gained entry. Inside each, they found a dazed 'victim', locked in a cage. They put each out of their misery and dragged their bodies over to the office building. Sam doused the building with some gas from a can he retrieved from the car and they had themselves a bonfire.

Back in the car, Sam said what Dean had been thinking. "I didn't see the leader."

Dean was sitting in the passenger seat, this time, holding his head in his hands. The sun was already giving him a headache. "I know. Me neither." He mumbled out from behind his hands.

"You don't think he..."

"Let me call Ben and check in."

Dean pulled out his cell and hit a button, speed dialing his son. It rang for what seemed forever before he picked up. Damn it boy, keep that thing handy in a crisis, would ya?

"_Hello?"_

"Hey, Ben, just checking in. How are things there?"

"_Uh, fine, things are fine. Amber's in the shower or she would come say hi."_

Dean frowned at his brother. "Really. Well, uh, we're almost done here. We'll be there in about ten minutes. Okay?" There was a long pause. "You still there, Ben?"

"_Yeah, uh, it was nice of you to visit. Enjoy your trip to Pittsburgh."_ Ben hung up and Dean looked at his brother in confusion.

"What?" Sam asked. "Everything okay?"

"Well, he told me Amber was in the shower and that he hoped we enjoyed our trip to Pittsburgh."

Sam looked surprised. "Pittsburgh? What's he...you don't think..."

"I do. He probably meant Poughkeepsie. Floor it Sammy. We gotta get back on the double."


	16. Chapter 16

The first hour dragged by. I wandered aimlessly around the house, unable to sit still. I would pause at random windows and doors, looking out, checking locks. At one point, I even turned on the game and sat in front of the tv. That didn't last long. I was soon up and pacing again.

After a while, I found myself standing at the sliding glass door that lead to the deck and backyard. I scanned the yard, looking for intruders. I zoned out after a bit and eventually became aware of a pair of haunted eyes staring back at me. For a brief moment I thought I was looking into the eyes of my father. There had been a few times when I'd caught my father just sitting, staring off into no where. The sadness and grief I had seen in Dean's eyes had been heavy and overwhelming. I was still getting to know Dean, in truth, and I thought, maybe, I might never fully know him. Especially at times like those, when the masks my father wore, fell away, revealing the immense sadness in his eyes.

I shook my head, bringing myself out of my thoughts and back into the here and now. Glancing one last time around the back yard, I went back to the couch and the game I had no interest in.

Eventually my alarm went off on my watch and I sighed with relief. Not because I wanted to be dosing Amber with dead man's blood, but because it gave me something to do. I went to the basement door, eased it open, and just stood there listening. I could hear small groans coming from below.

"I know you're there. Show yourself, Franken Ben." Amber's voice came out of the dark.

I made my way down the steps in the dark and flicked on a small flashlight, keeping it aimed at the floor when I made it to the bottom. "How are you doing, Babe?"

"It's getting harder, Ben. The hunger, or thirst, or whatever this is, almost hurts. It's so intense." She finished her reply with another groan.

I made my way over to the bar and grabbed the syringe I had pre-filled earlier. "I'm sorry you're messed up in all of this. I feel like I've brought my work home with me in the worst possible way."

"You ain't kidding, big guy. You'll owe me big time for this."

"Hmm, how many dinners are we talking?" I said with a chuckle.

"Oh we are talking more than dinner this time, but I'll start with that all-you-can-eat buffet over on Grant Ave." She grimaced.

"Well that's just your inner vampire talking. I'm sure I'll take you there and you'll just eat a salad." I came up behind her and tilted her head to the side.

"I will eat the biggest slab of beef you've ever seen, baby!"

"I will hold you to that! You ready?"

"Please, before that big slab of beef becomes you." I chuckled, but inside, I wanted to scream. It hurt so much to see her like this. "Don't take all day, baby, I need some relief."

"Sorry." I dosed her, she dropped off into drugged la-la land, and the phone rang upstairs. Setting the empty syringe on the bar, I hurried upstairs, hoping it was Dean checking in.

* * *

The phone call turned out to be one of Amber's co workers looking for some file. I made up some story about Amber being out of town and assured them I would have her call back as soon as possible. I sat back down on the couch, staring hard at my cell, trying to will it to ring with news of a successful hunt. When my staring didn't accomplish anything, I slipped the phone into my pocket and got back to wandering around the house again.

At one point I saw some movement back at the row of bushes that lined the back edge of the yard. I adjusted my grip on the machete and stood to the side of the window, peeking out. Damn dog. I was so jumpy, that when my alarm went off again, I just about flew out of my skin. Where had the second hour gone? I checked my watch again to make sure. Somehow, I had spent an entire hour wandering the house and never noticed the passage of time.

As I made my way down the steps to the basement, I once again could hear Amber groaning. "I'm coming, babe, hold on."

"No, Ben. Something's not right." She sounded quite distressed and I lifted the flashlight toward her face more so I could see her better.

"What's wrong?" Her eyes had that far away look one sometimes gets when they are listening to something, or looking at something within their own head. She wasn't really seeing me, or my flashlight, while we stood right in front of her.

"I think Klaus is talking to me again."

"Damn, that means Dean and Sam haven't gotten him yet."

"No, it's not that, Ben. I think... I think he's...here."

Just as she said that, I heard glass breaking upstairs. Damn it. I had no idea how good I'd be in a fight with my shoulder and ankle not being 100%. I had no idea if I should go upstairs to meet the threat head on, or stay here to protect Amber. I finally decided I had the element of surprise if I stayed down here. Upstairs, I had no idea where he was, but down here, there was only one way he could get down here. I decided to hide out back by the washing machine. When he cleared the stairs I could take his head from behind.

I ducked behind the machine and waited. My heart was pounding and I had broken out in a cold sweat. _Calm down, Ben, you're a cop for God's sake!_ I worked at steadying my breathing and listened as the door at the top of the stairs clicked open.

"Amber. I know you are down here. Why do you hide from me, your master?"

"You stay the fuck away from me, you freak!" Amber spit out. I rarely ever heard her use language like that and it was a bit shocking in it's vehemence.

I could hear Klaus's heavy foot falls on the creaky basement steps coming ever closer to the bottom. He paused a few steps from the end and it was quiet for what seemed ages.

"I don't like what they've done to you, pet." He said into the darkness.

"Well, I'm not too particularly fond of what you've done to me either." He chuckled quietly in response.

_Creak_ "Where's your young, dashing cop?" _creak_ I thought he would have attacked me by now. And then the scuff of his shoes touching down on the concrete.

Since I would be coming at him from his left side, I had switched the machete to my left hand and the flashlight to my right, hoping I was coordinated enough to use it that way. When I heard the second footfall on concrete, I flicked on the flashlight and swung with all my might with my left arm. I was hoping the sudden flare of light from the flashlight would disorient him long enough for me to make contact with the machete, but it wasn't happening. He spun around, and in one fluid motion, grabbed my left wrist in his right hand and my throat with his left. He picked me up, like I weighed nothing, and flung me across the room.

I landed on my back on top of the bar and rolled across it, dropping to the floor behind it. There were some glass shelves with various bottles on the wall behind the bar, in front of a large mirror. My foot snagged the bottom shelf as I rolled over and shattered it. Bottles and glass rained down on me. Luckily the bottles merely bounced off my back and ass to the floor. I still had the machete, tucked under me, and my right hand was on the floor in front of my face. It lay in something wet and sticky and I realized the bottle of dead man's blood had broken.

I slowly got to my feet in a crouch behind the bar. I wiped the dead man's blood off my hand, on my jeans, and retrieved one of the syringes of the stuff from my back pocket. Blessedly still intact, I raised it up and pulled it's cap off with my teeth. I inched my way to the end of the bar, staying in my crouch. I peeked around the end. My flashlight had fallen on the floor and cast a eerie glow about the room. I could see Klaus moving over toward Amber, speaking softly to her.

I came out behind him and again he was ready for me. I swear he had eyes in the back of his head. Again he grabbed my left wrist and my throat and pushed me back toward the wall. When my head hit the wall behind me, I brought my right hand up and jabbed the needle into his shoulder, pumping it's contents in. I tossed the syringe away and struggled to get the other one out of my pocket.

He started twisting my left wrist to the point where I thought my arm would snap. I gasped and dropped the machete. He was squeezing my neck harder and breathing was becoming difficult. I finally freed the second syringe. I reached it up over his arm and pulled the cap with my teeth again. He just watched me do it, growled, and squeezed harder. I began to see spots and just jabbed the needle into the closest piece of flesh I could find.

He let go of me and stepped back, the syringe dangling from his forearm. I gasped for air and watched as he reached over, pulled the needle out, and tossed it aside. I shoved him as hard as I could and he stumbled back a few paces. I couldn't understand how he could even still be on his feet, but I didn't have time to worry about that now. I got down to the floor searching for the dropped machete. I found it and switched it to my right hand. As I came up out of my crouch, his fist came down. I felt like I'd been hit with a sledge hammer. My head spun around and I dropped back to my hands and knees.

"Stop! Ben, just get out of here!" Amber was getting restless and as much as I loved her concern for me, I wasn't about to leave her here with this fucker if I could help it.

Klaus reached down and grabbed me by my hair and yanked me up to my feet. Pulling back on my hair, he wrenched my head back so that I was looking up at him. The guy was really huge. I think he may have been taller than Sam, really. He brought me in so that our chests bumped up against each other. It could almost have been a lover's embrace.

I brought my right hand up, behind his back, hoping I could at least plant the machete in his neck, make any type of wound on the guy. He brought his left hand up, then, and squeezed and twisted my bum shoulder. I screamed, dropped the machete, and swore I could hear an audible pop as he manually dislocated my shoulder again. My right arm dropped uselessly and painfully to my side. He chuckled.

"You're bleeding, pig." He whispered to me and leaned in and licked the blood from my face at the corner of my mouth. My stomach rolled.

He ran his fingers down along the side of my exposed neck in a spidery soft touch, sending chills down my spine. He leaned in, again, ignoring all rules of personal space, and said "Your dead man's blood is useless. I have spent centuries building an immunity to that shit." He spit the last word out and pulled me away from him by my hair and let me go.

I reached up and held my right shoulder. The pain burned and spread out down my back, chest, and arm. Klaus considered me, tilting his head to the side, in thought. He then brought his right fist down into the side of my face. Before I could even react to it, he grabbed my hair in his left, raising my face back up, and hit me again. He did that several more times and my forehead and eye on my left side were bleeding and swollen. The blood was pouring freely down my face and I was beginning to see spots. I warred with the unconsciousness that was trying to claim me. I couldn't pass out. I was no help to Amber that way. Not that I was much help to her like this, either.

He brought in a killer blow to my gut. It was hard enough to lift me off my feet. I collapsed to the floor, the wind knocked out of me. I struggled to breathe. I struggled to remain conscious. I looked over and saw that Klaus was once again at Amber's side, working at removing the tape that bound her to the chair. I got myself up to my knees, sitting back on my heels, and my phone rang.

Klaus froze and looked over at me. We stared at each other for what seemed an eternity. He finally broke the silence. "You will answer it and you will act like nothing is wrong..." He put his hand over Amber's mouth and twisted her head back around at an ungodly angle. Her eyes bugged out and her hands, at her thighs, clenched into fists. "...or I rip her head off."

He eyed me and asked, "You **do** believe I can rip her head off, don't you?" I nodded my head. "Then do we have an understanding?" I nodded again. "Go on, then."

I swallowed, the saliva stuck in my throat. I got myself up onto my knees and worked at freeing my phone from my front right pocket with my left hand. I finally got it out and it tumbled to the floor. I snatched it up, thinking furiously. If this was my father, how could I get the message to him that all was not right without raising Klaus's suspicions?

"Hello?" I answered.

My brain raced with options as Dean spoke on the other end.

"Uh, fine, things are fine. Amber's in the shower or she would come say hi."

Stupid. That was stupid. I looked up nervously, at Klaus, who gave a little jerk to Amber's head, causing her hands to jerk open, grabbing her thighs. Dean said something else, but in all honesty, I have no idea what he said. My brain suddenly flashed to a conversation we once had over a beer. Sam had been telling me about the many ways he and Dean communicated to each other when things were dire. They had some word they used that meant run away. A town or something...started with a 'P'. Damn it! Dean had finished speaking so I muttered what I hoped was right and prayed he got the message.

"Yeah, uh, it was nice of you to visit. Enjoy your trip to Pittsburgh." I hung up and pulled the phone away from my ear.

"Toss it to the floor, over here." Klaus said. I did so and he brought his heel down on it, smashing it. Damn it. I could only hope Dean got the message.


	17. Chapter 17

Klaus let go of Amber's head and resumed removing her tape bindings.

"Can you see him?" He said softly to Amber as he worked at the tape.

"Yes." She answered. She seemed in a daze. I had never gotten to give her the most recent dose of dead man's blood and she was coming fully into her vampire self.

"Can you _hear _him?"

"Yes. His heart races like a rabbit and he pants like a dog." Her response chilled me to the bone.

"Can you _smell_ him?"

"Mmm, yes."

"Amber. No. It's me, Ben. Babe, don't listen to him! Don't just _look_ at me, Amber, _see _me!"

She looked at me and grinned. In the half light of the flashlight's glow, it was more of a grimace that showed her mouth full of vampire teeth. Klaus finished with the tape and Amber practically launched herself up, out of the chair. She stood equally distant from both of us, hugging herself as if cold. Klaus came over to me and yanked me to me feet by my upper arm and hair. He dragged me over and shoved me down into the chair in her place.

He got down on his knees behind the chair and twisted my left arm up behind me. My right arm continued to just hang at my side, throbbing. He grabbed a fistful of my hair again and yanked my head back, exposing my neck and the side of my face with the blood all over it.

"Look at the blood, pet. I know you're hungry. Why do you fight it so?" He leaned over me and licked some of the blood from my face.

"Amber, my God, don't do this. Fight it!" I pleaded. She smiled again and slowly made her way towards us. "Amber, I know you're still you, in there. For the love of God, don't do this!" The tears sprang from my eyes, flowing freely down my cheeks, mixing with the blood, not for myself, but for what had been done to Amber. They could kill me if they wanted, but I cried for what I had gotten her into and what had become of her.

Klaus gave a yank to my left arm and I cried out. Amber walked up and stood over me, smiling again. She was lost to me. I couldn't read her expression at all. I was horrified at what I saw there. Or, rather, what I didn't see there. She ran a finger through the blood and tears on my cheek and held it up, examining it.

"Do it." Klaus said from above me. He was leaning in, eager for this to be over. I could just make out his face, up over my shoulder. "Give in to the hunger, pet. You will feel so much better. The pain will ease." I started to say something, but he jerked my arm again and I never got a word out.

Amber reached over and ran her finger down across Klaus's cheek, leaving a bloody red stripe in it's wake. She put a leg in between mine and straddled my left leg. She reached out, over my shoulder, and cupped Klaus's jaw in her small hands. She pulled his face toward hers and kissed his forehead. The smile that spread across his face was pure pleasure. She leaned in again, making to kiss him full on the mouth, when his eyes bugged out and he gasped. He pulled back further on my hair drawing a gasp from me as well.

Amber pulled him further out over my shoulder causing him to let go of me entirely. I turned my head to see what was going on and was shocked by what I saw. Amber had taken her slender, well manicured nails, and dug them into Klaus's neck below his jaw, on either side. As she pulled him forward, she worked her fingers in deeper and deeper. His eyes were as big as saucers and he made gurgling sounds. Blood started to sputter out of his mouth.

"God damn you to the deepest pits of Hell, you son of a bitch." She growled in his face. She raised her right foot and planted it against his hip and heaved backwards. She let out an unearthly howl and ripped his head clean off. She stumbled backwards with the sudden shift, when the head came clear, and fell ass over teakettle. Klaus's blood sprayed from what was left of his neck, drenching me in a shower of gore.

When the shock of what I had just seen passed, my concern for Amber flooded back. I quickly got up to see if she was okay, but I rose too fast, and the room spun around me. My momentum carried me face first, right to the floor. Everything went hazy, then black.

* * *

Sam and Dean pulled into the driveway and were jumping out of the car almost before it came to a stop. Dean had forgotten about the blood all over his head and he was a frightful sight to see. Machetes in hand, they ran up to the house and let themselves in. There they stopped. They looked, they listened. The house was deathly quiet. Sam looked at his brother.

Dean shook his head. "I'll tell you, they are both downstairs, but something is wrong." Sam raised his machete and headed to the basement stairs. "Wait, Sammy. You go make the antidote, but ah, make enough for three."

"Oh no, Dean..."

"It's okay, just go. Unless you have the antidote, don't come near us." Dean held his machete ready and started down the stairs. "Hello?" There was no answer. When he made the bottom and turned, he was surprised. Klaus was lying face down on the floor in a large pool of blood, with his head lying over by the wall. Ben was sprawled out on his stomach, head, thankfully, attached. Ben couldn't be dead, he had sensed his presence upstairs. He rushed over and turned Ben over. Dean smacked his face, lightly, a few times and Ben started to come to.

Ben groaned. "You look like a cast member from the Carrie movie, dude." Dean said, taking in his blood soaked son.

"So do you." Ben put a hand on his stomach and groaned. Dean raised a hand to his face, having forgotten all about the blood shower he had received as well. "I don't feel so hot. Something's wrong." Ben groaned again.

"Yeah, well, thanks to your stint as an extra in Carrie, you're a vamp now too. Just lay there and take it easy, okay? Sammy is gonna whip us up some antidote. Sit tight." Dean stood back up and looked down at Ben, tilting his head to the side. "Your arm messed up again?" Dean bent back down feeling Ben's shoulder. "Yeah, sorry, kid, this won't feel good." Dean grabbed Ben's wrist, put his foot against his ribcage, and gave Ben's arm a good yank and twist.

"Son of a bitch!" Ben yelled out as his arm popped back into place.

"Not so loud, eh kid?" Dean headed over to the bar and started rummaging around. He came up with a glass, went over to what was left of Klaus, and collected some blood. He went to the top of the stairs, poked his head out and called to Sam. "Here's Klaus's blood. Make two batches from this."

"So Klaus was here then. Good on Ben for taking him out." Sam took the glass and headed back to the kitchen.

Dean closed his eyes and clenched his jaw. The hunger was starting to get intense. "Hurry up with that shit, would ya Sammy?" Dean called after him.

Sam called back from the kitchen, "You can't rush greatness, Dean!"

Dean rolled his eyes and went back downstairs to find Amber. After seeing Ben's condition, he was worried about her.

He wandered slowly around the basement, finally coming across her in the corner past the pool table. She was sitting, facing the corner, holding her hands out in front of her. She was slowly rocking back and forth and her hands were covered in blood and shaking. "Amber?" Dean said quietly.

She didn't respond. He gently put his hand on her shoulder. "Amber."

She turned her head, slightly, and looked down at Dean's hand on her shoulder. "I almost did it, Papa Dean. I was so close." She leaned over and dry heaved. "Oh God."

Dean grabbed both her shoulders. "Shhh. It's okay. It's over."

"You don't understand. I almost drank Ben's blood! How could I even entertain the thought? But there I was, hovering over him, his blood glistening on his face, calling to me. It was so loud in my head. Does that make sense? I just...I just had to make it stop!"

Dean drew back from her a bit. "Amber, did you...?

"No...God help me, no. I was so close, though." She leaned over and dry heaved again. "No, I took out my anger on Klaus instead." She raised her bloody, shaking, hands up a bit. "I killed him, papa Dean, I...I killed him." Amber started sobbing.

Dean settled down to the floor behind Amber. He sat sideways to her, leaning back against the wall, and stretched his legs out behind her back. He reached an arm around her and pulled her shoulder into his chest and just held her. Poor kid was not going to recover from this easily. She seemed strong, though, and although the road would be difficult, Dean felt sure she would come through fine at the other end.

They sat like that for what seemed like ages. Amber, quietly crying and clutching at Dean's arm around her like a safety line, and Ben curled up out on the floor, groaning. Eventually there was a knock at the basement door. Sam called down, "Now serving Dean's Own Specialty Ass Stew."

"Oh, he's hilarious." Dean quietly said. He gave Amber a small squeeze and got up. He met Sam at the bottom of the stairs. Sam's eyes got big as he took in the scene before him. Ben, a bloody mess in the middle of the floor, with a headless Klaus nearby.

"Huh. Like father, like son. What is it with you two?" Sam smiled.

"All right, all right." Dean said.

Sam grinned at him and took the glasses he was carrying over to the bar. "These two are Klaus..." he said as he set two off to the side and handed the third to Dean "...and this one's yours."

"You're enjoying this far too much, little bro." Dean took the glass but set it on the bar. "No, I can wait. Those two first. Why don't you help Ben to the utility sink over in the laundry area and I'll take Amber upstairs to the bathroom." Sam nodded his head and headed over to Ben.

Dean went back to Amber, who had stopped crying. "You ready to put an end to this once and for all?" Amber nodded her head. "Let's get you upstairs to the bathroom, then." Amber looked at him in confusion. "The antidote is going to make you sick." Dean made an apologetic face and shrugged his shoulders.

She struggled to get up without touching anything with her bloody hands. Dean held out his hand and she gratefully took it. Yeah, she'll be okay, thought Dean, if she's concerned about getting blood on stuff. He took her by the bar, grabbing a glass of Ass Stew as they passed. He noticed Sam had Ben leaning over the utility sink and was heading back to the bar for his dose.

Up in the master bathroom, Amber grabbed a hair tie from the counter and put up her hair. "Okay, lay it on me."

"Huh?" Dean had gotten distracted by glancing in the bathroom mirror at himself. His hair, face and shoulders were caked in sticky drying blood. "Oh, yeah, um, you'll want to be in position, if you know what I mean. This stuff is pretty fast acting."

As Amber knelt in front of the toilet with a disgusted look on her face she asked, "How long is this going to last?"

"You're not gonna feel so great for a few days." Dean answered as he held out the glass to her. "Down the hatch, every last drop."

Amber took it and made a face. "Oh my God! This smells...ugh...like..."

"Ass. I know."

Amber plugged her nose and chugged it down. She almost immediately dropped the glass, made a horrible face, and then went for the toilet.

Dean excused himself and headed back downstairs to get his own glass of cheer.


	18. Chapter 18

Epilogue

* * *

The next three days were a horrible haze. I was set up in the basement with a cot. I alternated between puking, moaning, and sleeping. Dean stayed on the couch, occasionally running to the bathroom, swearing up a storm. Amber was in the master bedroom, keeping to herself, for the most part. Sam did his best to make all three of us as comfortable as possible and keeping us hydrated, but thought he'd completely lose his mind if his brother called him Nurse Sam one more time.

When Sam wasn't nursing all of us through vampire detox, he took care of Klaus's remains. No one asked what he did with them and he didn't offer to tell. He bought groceries, knowing we would be starving once the initial detox ended. He surfed the internet looking for a new job, but everything was fairly quiet. With Heaven having been set back to rights some years ago, even the demons seemed to have settled down.

I finally dragged myself from the basement after the worst three days in recent memory. I literally crawled up the stairs, I had no energy to do more. I reached the door at the top of the stairs and pushed it open and crawled on all fours out into the hall. At this point, I was down to my boxers as I had removed my shirt and pants, having been covered in blood and...stuff. I had left them in the utility tub downstairs. I think I'll burn them. I felt disgusting and wiped out.

Sam came over and helped me to me feet and led me over to a chair in the kitchen. "If you can manage to stay upright, I'll get you something to eat."

I held onto the table, for support, and nodded my head. "I'm starving." My voice was raspy. My throat felt raw, the muscles in my back and abdomen were sore, but my stomach was definitely growling.

"What do you think you can handle? I've been grocery shopping, so I can do about anything for breakfast."

"What time is it?"

"Breakfast time. Don't worry about it. What do you want, Ben?"

I thought for a moment. I wasn't used to having people wait on me. "Pancakes." I said with a smile.

"Pancakes it is. Chocolate chips or no?" He asked as he started digging around getting the stuff he needed to make them.

"Chocolate chips? What, in the pancakes?" Ben had never heard of putting chocolate chips in pancakes.

"Yeah! You've never had them that way before? Once in a rare while, when I was a kid, Dean would make me pancakes with chocolate chips in them. We'd smear peanut butter on them and then top them with the maple syrup. You haven't lived til you've had them that way." Sam had a far away look in his eyes, as some memory flitted through his mind, and a grin on his face.

"Well, then," I said, "Let me live. I'll have them with chocolate chips. I won't guarantee the peanut butter though." Sam chuckled and got to work making his pancakes. "Where's Dean?" I asked.

"He showered and stepped outside for some air about an hour ago. I'm sure he'll sense food being prepared and come in shortly." Sam answered with a chuckle.

I watched Sam as he did his thing. I've spent so much time watching my father, trying to figure him out, that I realized I never spent much time considering my uncle. He went about his pancake prep with a smile on his face. "You're good for him." I said it, but wasn't really sure where it came from. It just hit me out of no where.

"Excuse me?" Sam said turning from the counter, bowl and spoon in hand.

"My father. You're good for him. I never really thought about it before. But you...I don't know how to put it into words."

Sam smiled. "Amber called me his rock."

"Amber? When was this?" I hadn't seen Amber and thought she was still recovering.

"Last night, when I went in to give her some juice. She told me something along the same lines. Called me Dean's rock."

I grinned to myself. Much like she was my rock. "Rock. That's a great word for it. You seem to be a calming force in his life. Also a safe place, a refuge, if you will. Always there."

"Yeah, well, I haven't always been there for him. I'm no saint." Sam looked down at the floor, embarrassed maybe. "Dean has had a hard life, no doubt. We both have, but him... He practically raised me, Ben. Because of our...out of the ordinary upbringing and circumstances, his world revolves around me. It's not always healthy, but...it is what it is and I've become okay with it. I've come to terms with it. He does his best to not cling and I make sure he knows it when he does."

"Alright. Enough with the chick flick crap." Dean said as he came into the kitchen. He looked relaxed. I rarely saw him that way. I guess it was because the hunt was over and there was nothing pressing for them to move on to. He had fresh jeans and a henley on. "Nice day out today."

"Seriously, Dean?" Sam said. "You're going to bring the conversation around to the weather?"

"Yup. That and food. Do I see the makings of chocolate chip pancakes in here?" He gave one of his lop sided grins and Sam just shook his head. Dean set himself down in the chair next to me. "How ya doin', kiddo?"

"Sore and hungry." I said with a grin of my own. I would have liked to have continued my chat with Sam. Maybe another time. I looked around the kitchen at my family. And yes, I think I have finally accepted these two as family. They were no longer curiosities, but had become loved ones. And thinking of loved ones...someone was missing. "I'm going to go check on Amber." I shakily got up from my chair.

"You okay? Need a hand?" Dean asked, reaching for me.

"No. No, I got it. Thanks though." I made my way back to the bedroom and leaned heavily on the door frame. I knocked gently on the door. "Amber?" No answer. I raised my voice a bit. "Amber? It's me, Ben."

"Go away." Came from the other side. I frowned.

"Go away? Are you still sick, Babe?" There was no response for what seemed like ages.

"You don't want to talk to me, Ben."

I had no idea what she was going on about and decided to let myself in. I slowly opened the door, peeking around the edge of it as I did. Amber was sitting on the edge of the bed, facing the window and away from me. I went over but didn't sit next to her. Something was obviously bugging her and I didn't want to physically intrude into her personal space. "Amber. Honey, what's wrong? Why wouldn't I want to talk to you?" I knelt on the floor in front of her, partly so I could see her face and partly because I didn't have the strength to hold myself up too much longer.

"I was a monster, Ben. You deserve better than me."

"What? No, Amber. You couldn't have done anything different. You didn't ask to be turned into a vampire. It wasn't your fault. You can't blame yourself for that." I reached out and started to brush some of her hair away from her face, so I could see her, but she turned away from me.

"That's not what I mean, Ben. In the basement, when...he...had you. I..." She started to cry. I had never seen Amber get like this before. She was always so steady. She was _my_ rock. I wasn't sure how to react. I wanted desperately to take her in my arms and hold her, but I got the distinct feeling that she wouldn't allow it.

"Baby, I don't feel any anger or hurt feelings, or...anything toward you. I don't know what you're talking about! I'm just thankful we've all come out the other side in relatively one piece!" I reached out and put my hand on her knee, not able to resist touching her in some way. She allowed it, much to my surprise.

"Ben, you don't understand. I...I _wanted_ to drink your blood. You have **no** idea how close you were to becoming a snack for me. The whole time I spent walking towards you, when you were held in that chair? All I could think about was your warm blood spilling over my face and down my throat. Easing the wretched pain in my gut." She covered her face with her hands. I didn't say anything. I didn't want to stop her and I was afraid if I opened my mouth it would ruin the moment.

"Ben. I have been having nightmares. Not of killing Klaus, although that would seem the logical thing to be having nightmares about, but of you. I dream of ripping your throat open and satisfying my thirst. I wasn't strong enough...I-"

"No. Stop. Amber, look at me. Look at me!" I couldn't let her continue on like this when it wasn't true. I reached up and took her face in my hands, turning her toward me. "Amber, my God, you were strong. You are strong! You are one of the strongest women I know! You say you wanted to drink my blood? Of course you did! You were a vampire! It's what they do! I, in no way, hold that against you, babe. You were strong because, even though you were wanting my blood so bad, you resisted. Right up to the end. You defeated Klaus, when all I did was act like the best punching bag you've ever seen!"

She actually chuckled. "You do make a pretty good punching bag."

"Oh, well, gee thanks!" We were both quiet for a moment. I lowered my hands to her knees.

"Thank you, Ben." She rested her hands on mine.

"For what?"

"I was so sure that you were going to be upset with me. That you were going to see me as weak. I never actually stopped to see how you actually felt about it. Thank you for setting me straight and accepting me."

"Seriously, Amber, what would I do without you? You called Sam, Dean's Rock. Well, you are _my_ rock. You are my safe, steady place in the storm. When I came back from finding Dean a couple years ago? I think I would have been a much bigger mess if I hadn't had you to come home to. I know I haven't been completely forthcoming with everything that happened on that trip, and I promise I'll tell you every last detail if you want to hear it, but you saved me from what could have been a very dark place. Don't you _ever_ think I deserve _better_ than you. I don't deserve _you_! And, in all honesty? You make one badass little vampire. You scared the shit out of me." I smiled up at her and she still had tears falling down her cheeks, but she was smiling at me.

"You smell." She said, as she got up and went over to our master bathroom and held the door open to me.

"Really? I spill my heart out to you and all I get is 'you smell'?"

"Well you do! You're covered in vomit and vampire blood. How can I possibly kiss and make up with you when you are so disgusting?" She said this with a twinkle in her eye and for as weak as I felt, I literally jumped up off that floor and headed in to take a shower. Amber was nice enough to help me out.

* * *

"Oh good Lord, did you guys make chocolate chip pancakes?"

Dean turned to look at Amber and I standing in the doorway of the kitchen. "Yes we did, Amber. Good to see you up and about."

"Sweet! Do you have peanut butter too?" She almost ran to an open chair and pulled herself up to the table.

Sam caught my eye and smiled. "See, Ben? You gotta have them with the peanut butter."

"Fine. Alright. Apparently I'm the only one here who hasn't had the wonder of chocolate chip pancakes with peanut butter and syrup." I pulled up to the table and looked at my 'family'. Dean was heartily stuffing his face and grinning while he did so. Amber was smiling from ear to ear as a plate full of pancakes was set in front of her. And Sam? He looked back at me and we shared a moment. We both knew our places in this messed up little family and we were both okay with it. We smiled at each other and dug into our own plates of pancakes and God were they the greatest thing I had ever had!


End file.
